A City of Parasols
by SunderingSlime587
Summary: Usually, the SI gets all the money, friends and glory. So when I start having to hide away from the very people I need to befriend, living like a hobo for six months, murdering monsters like nobody's business for money, dealing with trans-dimensional physics and politics, not to mention the whole running around the world for the dragon balls with a frying pan, things get...strange.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors note: This fanfic is going to be crossing into mutliple fandoms into the future, including, but not limited too, kirby, the mother series, dragon quest, and other possibilities along the way. Also, for anyone going to have flak as to why I wrote a crossover as a regular story, it was mainly because the crossover feature couldn't handle the amount of fandoms i was putting in for the future, and the fact that I find the crossover feature** **a prime factor to have your story rotting away if it mainly involves an obscure fandom crossover, as in this case. Also, there will be usage of two languages in this fanfic, though this is not evident in this chapter, with the words in the other language bolded and translated into proper english dialogue, and just translated if they are simply narration.**

 **Word guide:**

 **Khabarastan- The urdu word for a graveyard**

 **Jinn- The spirits of middle eastern mythology and religion, made of smokeless fire. They live in abandoned areas, and have supernatural abilities, and while most are docile unless provoked, some are not above the possession of humans or dabbling in the occult, much like the ghosts and ghouls of western culture.**

 **Nafsaani- One of the three main types of dream categories in Islamic theology, it refers to a dream that springs from the persons imagination or daily workings.**

Chapter 1: Mary Poppins

It all started with a gust of wind on my face, the nimble fingers of the air were enough to wake me up, seeing that it was going at some ungodly speed. But sleeps silky touch had lulled me into her spell, and a simple gust of wind, no matter how fast wasn't going to rouse me from my slumber, for she had taken great pains to impede my senses to that of a drunkard.

A-ACHOOO!

As spittle landed all over my face, and unfortunately due to a wind current, my clothes as well, i was goaded into opening my eyes. What i saw was not my bed, nor the room that i had gone to bed in only a few hours before, but the wide blue sky, its sapphire seas obscured by a stampede of fast moving clouds, their fluffy coats bopping in the air, as ever greater winds sped them away.

Of course, I wasn't concerned, far from fright even, as I cocked my head left and right, noticing that I held in my hands a red and white parasol. As I glided through the wind, it felt like someone had tried to make a parasol waddle dee, but had gotten the subject wrong.

 _Well... this is certainly new. I wonder what caused this one?_ I mused to myself. I wasn't a dreamer, one should now. The last dream I had gotten had been nearly a decade ago, involving a really bad nightmare fuel parody of little red riding hood. If you wanted dream stories, my mother and sister were the place to go, for their gray matter could weave a story unlike any other on the loom of sub consciousness. One time my sister was doing dream cinema premium one night, now that was a weird day. As for me, I got my father's dream represent. If the brain was working nonstop on the loom in my mother and my sister as they dozed, mines was dozing along with me.

 _Huh, never thought I'd get one of them nafsaanis, those confused dreams... ah well, might as well enjoy it while it lasts, although this is getting quite repetitive_..., I thought to myself, my eyes already tired of the scenery before me, and beginning to be lured by the duchess of slumber with her chamomile hands, back into inertness.

So I did what any rational person getting tired of a dream would, pinch himself. I mean, that is the general way on waking up. But strangely enough, it didn't work.

 _Huh? Maybe I didn't pinch myself hard enough?_ I thought to myself. I wasn't made of diamonds, nor was I some overpowered jock, in fact, I could be considered the very example of noodle armed, but I was a tough cookie, for walking two blocks bleeding all over and carrying a bike attests to that, at least I think it does. So I pinched myself once again, hard enough to the point where I accidentally drew blood. I hadn't cut my nails in a while, and like a head-in-the-clouds fool hadn't noticed that I had cut right through my skin.

 _Okay... this cannot be happening..._ , I venomously drawled out those words in my head. Either I had taken one too many a random drug, or the guy upstairs had decided to pull a taxing page from his book of fates.

And then I noticed.

The sky. It wasn't the one I knew. This one was alien in every sense. The design of the clouds, which I had previously overlooked, was not the one I had known. No, this was done in "that" style, anime to be precise. Looking down with eyes shivering as if a blizzard hit them, I noticed that my hands, my clothes, nay my whole body, had been swallowed up and clad in the style that now was around me.

Thus, in the middle of nowhere, a small little kernel of madness erupted out of the meadow of sanity that I called my head. It sprouted and grew higher and higher, first as a smirk, then a giggle, a laugh and soon after, as a cackle that would put witches to shame. Smirking as I eased my head, I said, with much of a wistful tone, something that would soon haunt me for quite a while, like a jinn following a frightened one in an abandoned house or a khabarastan, a graveyard really.

"Toto... it seems we aren't in Kansas anymore."

0o0o0o0o

Soon getting over my shock at the situation, I immediately held fast the parasol, without a second doubt, for hysteria over being in another dimension. no matter how big of a crazy factor that was, was not tolerable in any form right now. _The last thing I need is for my stupidity to send the good old reaper with the cloth of souls to get me_ , I thought with a hard face plastered on, looking like a sculpture an artist would construct in a bout of depression. As the clouds began to slowly clear, I was finally able to see land, and inside of me, a little shrill laugh erupted, avid over this new verdant land, as another side of me harrowed over its potential dangers.

 _Well, at least the book of fates didn't have me parasol away in an ocean_ , I pondered, thanking him for the fate he had decided to string for me. As the winds slowly died down, like an infant after a hefty meal of milk, I was able to twist my parasol left and right to change direction, wistfully wishing all that while that I could have a bit more fun with the parasol. Scanning the surrounding area, I saw a wondrous world spreading out, like someone had gone and rolled out a carpet like a welcoming mat. There were forests so verdant with green they looked like they had been there for ages, deserts whose fierce heat and golden sands concealed harsh truths, and tranquil isolation, oceans that glistened like sapphires in the face of the topaz - like sun, and mountains so tall, they looked like they would never topple over. _A beautiful realm indeed... too bad I'm busy trying to make sure I don't kick the bucket to admire it much_ , I mused slightly in the dumps.

However, fate must sure have been generous for as soon as that thought had entered my head, I saw a concrete jungle arising from the hills and valleys, steel and glass glittering away with the fame they stood for. But something was not quite right, for as I neared the city, there were many odd features about it. The architecture was just too curvy or too angular; the whole city looked like something out of an art deco from the 30's. Furthermore, as I flew ever closer to the smog, the rowdy revel of its people and its hazy air due to the hot smog belching out from some of the buildings nearly constricted my lungs like a cobra lurking after its meal, fangs baring, I noticed that the transportation, nay the populace, was on airs. Literally, all the cars were busy levitating, almost like they all had magnets under them! _Amazing... there is much to sight-see here! Provided I don't die of malnutrition first..._ , I thought with a bitter smile, as I realized that an inescapable price would come for this cosmopolitan beauty.

Eventually, I came down even further down to ground, enough to see signs and house ceilings. As I floated left and right, I managed to catch a glimpse of a city entrance sign. It seemed I had been drifting in from the west and these were the city outskirts that I had been in. The board of course, astonished me beyond belief, not due to flamboyant prose or vibrant hue, mainly because I didn't care for those things, and the fact that I was a tad foot too high to see anything in the first place. Rather, it was the four words plastered onto it, which I barely made out due to the way it was facing, damned city planning at it's finest right there, I tell you!

Welcome to West City!

With this sentence, the water mill known as my brain, spurred on by the blood in my veins, made the connections. There was only one place where the sky looked like this, for every anime has its own version of a sky, some more drawn out than others, others animated up, with this being a hybrid of the two. There was only one place where the cities were named after the spokes on a compass like this.

"So…. this is the world of DBZ, huh, neat…" I said, not really shocked much. I already knew that I had been whisked away somewhere, I just didn't know where. Of course, the next thing to do was to find out which era of the DBZ universe i was in. Of course, you can tell that by the sky too. In this case, the sky was definitely a hybrid of drawing and animation, but the more modern kind, animation dominant, placing it somewhere after Majin Buu, that is how all the ova's after that ear looked like, at least. To be quite fair, I had only just started watching Dragon Ball, it had never been a part of my childhood in any way, so I was bound to make some mistakes, but right now, mistakes could lead to my demise, a hard truth that I swallowed without hesitation, as I refocused on my current objective, coming down to earth safely. With that in mind, I tilted my umbrella to catch a eastern wind to fly my way to the only place I knew, the capsule corporation, but to be honest, i didn't know that it was to the east, it was just a gut feeling based on an early Dragon Ball episode, the one where Goku, as a kid had gotten lost in west city, it looked like he was generally going east to get to Bulma's house. However, I wasn't looking for their house, but for the trees on their property near the entrance. It would make a good base for the time, and besides i can't go into the brief household, i thought. If I went for their house directly, I would only cause trouble. My advanced level of knowledge about this place would surely lead to trouble, and getting the prince of all Saiyans, along with the z fighters ticked wasn't on my to do list. Plus, a hidden desire of me wanted me to keep my identity secret, while being near them, and let them work out my presence, a foolish move if I say so myself, but the temptation was too much to resist, a game of Radley's sorts, that and the hope that this scenario didn't turn into a really bad self-insert fanfic, praying that I somehow did not wind up devolving into the mother of all horrors, the Mary sue. Thus, I was swept away by the four winds, a lost soul on an unknown road, with only a destination to follow.


	2. Chapter 2: Trash and Treasure

**Authors Note:**

 **Word Guide:**

 **Hari Mirchi- A kind of hot pepper from India, it dries bright red in color**

 **Khopra- A kind of chutney made from coconuts and green in color, it's typically eaten with dosas and idlis in the south, and the whole of India as a snack**

 **Sambar- The classic Indian vegan soup, made of imli (tamarind), vegetables and spices, with drumsticks (the vegetable, not the chicken variety), added for taste (you eat them as you would a bone of marrow, you suck it up with your mouth. If you haven't consumed bone marrow before, think of trying to suck up the insides of a rolled up pastry... if that's even possible, or some other food that you can suck the insides out of.**

 **Dosas- A type of Indian crepe, generally made of lentils, it's treated like a roti (indian flatbread), and dipped in chutneys or sambar.**

 **Idlis- The Indian version of the far east rice dumpling, it's more like a circular patty, and treated like a dosa (dipped in chutneys or sambar), both of which come from the vegetarian southern portion of India.**

 **Words some of you may know but some don't (If you do know the words, please don't verbally kill me and accuse me of thinking you're stupid)**

 **Babel- A biblical tower, it was built by people trying to get to heavean, but God ceased the completion of it by scattering the people making it by making them each speak different languages**

 **Baba Yaga- A Slavic mythological figure, the name usually refers to herself, or to a sister in a trio, both with the same name. She's basically ambivalent motive-wise acting as both benefactor and villain in Slavic tales.**

 **I'm still trying to work out a schedule with this story, but I'll probably just stick to once a month, after this chapter. Also, for any native urdu speakers on the site, I'll probably wind up saying the language a bit slangy, considering I was brought up in America, so any corrections are welcome. Also if Vegeta and Bulma seem OOC in this, I apologize in advance. Also, looks like I labeled this chapter with the wrong number, oops. Just pretend that's a two, shall we?**

As I finally saw land from only a few feet above, I finally spotted the residence. It wasn't much of a surprise, a bunch of round areas linked by tunnels, painted beige with the company logo proudly emblazoned on the front. I finally swooped lower until I saw the tree that I was looking for, in the left corner of the front yard. Of course, while flying was one thing, a landing was clearly something of a whole nother degree, for as soon as I hit the leafy underbrush, I fell through at least five branches. How I didn't get my eyes shish kebabed through as I was falling, I'll never know.

" **AI! OUCH! YE KYA TOBI HE** "? (What is this even?), I shouted as I finally landed in a fork of the tree that had sprouted up from the trunk. You see, my parents were from the middle of India, Hyderabad to be precise, that land of spices, monsoons and killer cockroaches from the drainage, and so I had grown up speaking Urdu all my life, usually using it at the most inappropriate times, like when I'm in the middle of a universe that probably can't even understand that language anyway. As I sat down, nursing by behind, which was now aching like a gong that had been rung one time too many, I began to analyze, predict, and fear. I wasn't always like this, mind you, but when you're homeless in a place that doesn't even have a record of your existence, it's not easy to just laugh it off, that would only be if I was with somebody, for the joys of companionship are joys indeed.

Sighing, I realized that if I needed to survive here, I was going to need resources, food, water, the whole shebang. If I don't find anything, I'd probably starve to death within a few days due to lack of water _. I'm going to need to get a bottle, something to hold liquids. But what about food_..., I thought, though not before I bumped my head on something bumpy. As I cocked my head upward I saw that the tree was covered in little red fruits, lychee to be precise. "A **h! Ab me tho bukha nai hosakta!** " (there's no way I can go hungry now!), as I noticed that that there were lychee trees practically all over the property. _Never thought Bulma would be into exotic fruits... but this plays right into my hands,_ I said with a sly smirk. With this, my food securities were relieved, provided I didn't gorge myself like a glutton. However, the need for a water vessel still pranced around my head, to my own discomfort, silencing my once ecstatic emotions. I don't know where I'll be able to find clear water vessels or a bottle for that matter. The shopping district seems like the best place to find something like that, I thought, beginning to calculate a strategy, though not before I heard a door open. Startled, I climbed up the tree like a mad monkey and hid in a leafy portion of its canopy, though not before taking my umbrella, and what I just noticed as a backpack on my shoulders, up with me for concealment. Brushing a small portion enough for my eyes to see, I watched as a man walked outside. Face-hardened from lord knows how many battles, eyes sharp like the front of a katana, with hair spiky enough to give an unfortunate one a cut, it was Vegeta, the ego-inflated prince of all Saiyans. Just like predicted, he seemed incredibly pissed at something, his face a few shades of red away from being a dried hari mirchi. _Perhaps the gravity room broke again?_..., I thought, while looking at the prince with a curious stare from above.

My prediction was accurately foreshadowed, for no sooner that I had thought that Vegeta barked out, "WOMAN! Get that Gravity room fixed! Sitting on my ass isn't going to get me stronger that Kakarot, you know!"

 _Of course, he says that... why was I not surprised_ , I thought to myself, shrugging my shoulders, though not before a shrill shriek came from the house, whose owner was probably Bulma.

"Stop acting like a spoiled kid for once! One day without training won't kill you, you know. What you need is a break!"

At this, my mind flashed to Vegeta's appearance and personality itself in the show, and I couldn't help but smirk, _Bulma trust me, no matter if you drag him along, he's gonna take a vacation from vacation,_ I mused to nobody in particular.

Now it was Vegeta's turn to shout "NO I DON'T NEED A BREAK! TRAINING DOESN'T TAKE VACATIONS!"

I could see a pause from the household, what I interpreted as Bulma trying to come up with a suitable way to blackmail him in going, probably by denying to fix the gravity room.

"Suit yourself, Vegeta. But don't expect me to fix the gravity room if you do!" Bulma shrieked out, leaving Vegeta with a aggravated expression on his face. _I so knew it..._ , I thought with an aloof grin on my face. For all her years, Bulma had always been a skilled woman at manipulation and bargaining. Being rich has its perks I say.

"Come on, it's only for a day. Then you can go back to your manage and train all you want!" she yelled back to Vegeta, and from his facial expressions, it looked like he was being pricked by needles. Finally conceding a grunt, he followed her inside, completely oblivious to me.

 _Wait, if he couldn't sense me, does that mean..._ , I thought once more, calculations weaving in and out. _Of course! It would make sense I'd break physics here! It's not like I'm from here. So I'm practically Ki-less... this could bode well..._ I mused. Not having a Ki meant that physical blunders were my only potential cover blowers, meaning that I could be here for quite a while without being disturbed, the flipside being that I was technically powerless and that if any of the z fighters saw me, they'd think I was some depraved undead abomination. Of course, my satisfaction was once again cut off by my arid throats screeches for drink.

" **Amma! Me cu qui janna hai ab pani ke liye!** " (Why do I need to go for water right now?!), I groaned, as I daintily lifted myself off from the tree, slowly climbed down, and set out for my quest of sustenance.

0o0o0o0o0o

Hauling the parasol and the book bag on my back, I trudged into the downtown part of West city. I thought I had mentally prepared myself for the whole sci-fi bonanza going on here, but all the flying stuff still kept me on edge. People were walking up and down, left and right and everywhere in between, a little big apple of sorts, much to my homesickness, I was a jersey boy, but NYC was practically the big city for me, garbage piles as wide as an overweight blob, rickety food stands which permeated the air with their food for blocks, honking taxis and the adrenaline of walking people, the slightly stuffy hot air emanating from all the car exhaust, their smoke billowing out like the burps of a bloated fellow, and the rickshas whose steel bike wheels clinked on the pavement, which was weathered like old clay from the decades of torrential downpours, nor'easters, and hurricanes. This city, on the other hand, was almost _too_ clean; it felt almost wrong in a sense. However, it wasn't like the city was void of emotion, coffeehouses and pubs abounded, restaurant and cafes were everywhere, including what seemed like a dosa house, and the streets were littered with languages being spoken, mingling in the air, reminiscent of the sounds of babel, that tottering tower. _Better make a note of that place as soon as I get a sustainable amount of money,_ I thought, my stomach hungering and mouth near salivating like a mad dog for some khopra chutney and steaming sambar, along with God knows how long a dosa and platters of idlis.

However, my thoughts were cut short when I realized I was abysmally lost. I must have taken one too many a turn, and had lost the building I was using as a reference point, landing me straight in a garbage disposal area, even worse was that it looked abandoned, so I couldn't ask for directions, just my luck of course. _Great, now I can die of typhoid, dysentery and god knows what else is lurking in this place_ , I moaned inwardly, as I trudged beside large piles of trash, hoping to somehow find an exit...

BANG!

I turned around, hoping to find somebody, only to find that a can from one of the trash piles had gone and fallen down its hill. Disappointed, I turned back to continue my aimless wandering.

BANG BANG BANG!

This time, I visibly jumped at least a few feet and screeched a sound fit for a hyena. _What in heaven's name...!? Who's there?_ , I thought, trepidation and fear immersed in each of my steps toward the garbage pile that the noises were emanating from. As I hid behind the pile to make sure I wasn't noticed behind whatever in the world was going on beyond the pile, I saw what I could only label as an illusion, yet it was happening before my eyes.

To put it bluntly, a navy-blue cloud was being beat up and sat upon by... dragon quest slimes? _What in the world is the dark nimbus doing here, I thought Korin called it back after Tao hit the deck... and what are slimes doing... OH. OH GOD._ , I thought, calculations snapping me out my daze. If slimes were in the dbz universe, it meant that the whole parasol thing must have happened before, with someone else. It also made sense these guys were roped in, they were made by Toriyama too, after all, but that wasn't the only big whooping deal going on right, oh no! The slimes were also beating on one of their own! _Punishment for treason, or are they just acting like royal arses?_ I mused. Generally speaking, though, it probably was the latter. Slimes were generally considered weak monsters, so taking up their pent up aggression caused by all the teasing on their strength out on something on their level made sense, simple psychology here really.

What really was the difficult part, however, was the question on what the heck I should do. The whole scenario going round me was a fight-or-flight decision. Either I could quietly slink back and run like hell from here and somehow make my way back to capsule corp, which would probably work, considering they still hadn't noticed me, their adrenaline making them focus only on their skirmish. However, if I did fight, and managed to beat these guys without getting beat up too bad, I would not only be able to gain myself a mode of transportation, but also a potential ally in the mix, something that would greatly ease my ills, numerous enough as they were given my homeless status. Besides, the fact that I had already was lost enough and had no way around my city, coupling that with the fact that I was a vulnerable target alone, what with being a teenager and all, made the flight idea, once somewhat sane, all but moot. So, I slowly took off both my parasol and my backpack, and readied myself mentally, fear gripping me once more like the bony hands of baba yaga, shriveled and frigid.

 _I am soooo going to regret this…._ , I moaned inwardly, as I quickly grabbed the nearest possible blunt object to use as a weapon, which happened to be a slightly roughshod frying pan, as I jumped into the fray with a loud battle cry, which was probably just a really high pitched shriek, but that's not the point here!

"COME AND GET IT YOU GLOB-TROTTERS!" I exclaimed as I began swinging the pan left and right without a care in the world. Still buzzed up on adrenaline, and taken aback by my sneak attack, the poor things didn't know what hit them. Sure, in the madness, it wasn't like they weren't able to get a hit on me here and there, one of them head-butted me hard enough to twist my leg pretty bad, and another nearly missed trying to jump my mouth and suffocate me. Of course, my evading skills came in quite handily for the whole mess, dodging groups of students twenty to thirty strong in cramped high school hallways while carrying a swollen backpack like a dromedary has its perks you know. Eventually, after at least a good half hour of screaming, rolling around in the dirt and the incessant ringing of metal, I finally stood alone on the ground, the three slimes were long gone, having run away as soon as they had recovered, for I had only beaten them up to unconsciousness somehow, a blessing in disguise if I say so myself. No way was I going to be turned into a morgue worker, especially here and now of all times and places!

"Phew… that sure tuckered me out! Oh, I almost forgot! Gotta check on those two!" I exclaimed, as I began to walk toward the downed cloud and the slime, who looked more like a puddle from all the hits it took. But, before I did even put a foot forward, a strange glint of yellow caught my attention. Bending downward to examine the issue, I found much to my surprise, a couple gold coins. Running my fingers over them, I was astonished to see that they were made of actual metal, no fibbing here. _Better hit the bank or whatever factors as the currency exchange here to see how much this is worth, does the zeni even run on the gold standard?_ , I thought. However, my attention snapped back to the downed nimbus and its KO'd slime rider, and luckily for me, it seemed like they both were moving…. somewhat. _Well, at least they didn't die on me. It's not like I have the dragon balls here_ , I thought.

"Hey, anybody still alive you two? HELLO?" I said a little incessantly, impatient due to the continuous silence.

The cloud got up first, and the slime fell on the floor and started groaning. It seemed to want to convey something because it was swirling around like the froth in a coffee cup.

"Uhhh, hi. I'm Zain, pleasure to meet ya." I started, a little shook up on how to address the aerial creature.

The dark nimbus, however, did seem to know what I was saying, as it began to move around in a peculiar fashion. At first, I didn't comprehend what is doing, only to realize it was squishing itself, almost like what one does when they were mad, giving off a look that seemed to read that it was annoyed at how late I had come to the rescue.

"Wait, you knew I was here? But those slimes didn't even know what hit them!? How in the...?!", I shrieked out

Swirling around, the nimbus flattened itself and turned a light shade of gray, and it promptly showed me it's behind. The thing was quite literally calling me an ass for not coming to save it quick enough!

Slightly aggravated, I spoke once more, though now with the hints of a growl, " Why you little… ass as in donkey or behind? Because I swear, if you're going for the latter, you're going to have cast iron on your face… or whatever qualifies as your face!", I threatened, not having the sincerity to back that claim up, but my annoyance was enough to hoist the pan up.

At this, the nimbus began to turn a light shade of sky blue, and it looked like it was going to wet itself, running back and forth. I couldn't help but cock my head to the left as I tried to interpret what it was trying to convey.

"Let me guess…. you were stuck on Korin's tower, and you came down here to see the big ol' world, but I'm guessing you hit a snag in that plan of yours," I stated, matter-of-factly. The nimbus seemed to nod in confirmation, turning back to its indigo hue as a result.

At this, I could only help but chuckle. The poor thing thought I was gonna cream him, and to be honest, his running around was somewhat amusing, as odd as that sounds. _Well, better get to the main point at hand, and get back home!_ , I thought my head revolving round and round the lychee tree.

However, the nimbus broke my plotting with a rather jumpy expression, for it was hopping up and down and had nearly begun smashing itself into trash piles, yes it was that drunk on anticipation.

" **Aree! Ek minute ke lie thorasa khamosh resacte?!** " (Ugh! Can't you stay quiet for one minute?!), I shrilly cried out, my face contorted in an exasperated position.

The nimbus turned around, frontal area cocked in confusion; for it seemed that it had never heard such a language, fitting for one who had lived his whole life in the sky. But now the thing was looking at me like I had three heads and two pairs of eyes!

"Look, it's a long story, I'll tell you on the way back, you can't stay here, not on my watch you can't!" I said with a beaming smile, my smile as big as the sun.

The nimbus then proceeded to follow me, only to turn around and focus my attention on the still incapacitated slime, motioning towards it.

"Take him with us. We might just be able to figure out something from him, and we can't just leave him here. Also, we're headed to capsule corp."

At this, the nimbus looked like its eyes had dropped out of his head, well that is if had eyes, looking shocked that I would know such a place. _It appears Dende has been spreading gossip_ …., I thought smugly.

Laughing as I went, I replied quite sheepishly, "No you dunerdolt, I'm squatting on their property, a tree to be precise, it's been my home for say...an hour? Anyway, let's get going!" I exclaimed, as I slowly set foot, with a mute cloud and a fainted slime, incensed and refreshed, for the misadventure that is life.


	3. Chapter 3: Introductions and Bank Fiasco

**Well, I didn't expect to pull this off in a week, but here I am again! Comment and review, for any experience I get is most appreciated. Also, for further chapters, do you want the slimes to be using the slimeglish that I've given them, or just normal english? Just askin' here. Anyway, here's chapter 3!**

Word guide (I know I gave words the definitions in the paragraph, this is just for reference if you get reading burnout)

Chor- A thief, derogatory term in Urdu

Ulti- the urdu word for vomit, as well as the act of vomiting

Nadiria- The "hell" of the Zenithian trilogy in Dragon Quests 4-6, it usually functions as a final dungeon or a side-story post-game, host to a wide range of vilians like Grandmaster Nizmo, Psaro, and even the mighty superboss Estark. The word comes from nadir, meaning "the lowest point"

"Half off game"- A reference to Dragon Quest, where when you die, the penalty is all your party members except the main hero staying to dead to be revived at a church (costs money) and getting half your total gold deducted.

Qadr- The arabic word for fate, it's a muslim tenant where everything you do has already been recorded, but you have the free-will to bend a bit in that recorded path. Think a choose-your-adventure book, and you might get my point

Anda- The urdu word for a egg

Thope- An arab garb consisting of a long tunic, typically white but also in other colors, it's generally worn my men who go to the mosques, and in other countries like India, for that purpose as well as to not boil to death in the summers

Shaytani- A kind of jinn, these are the kinds that are evil and won't hesitate to kill humans or do some really demented mind-bending to get some depraved pleasure out of it. There's hundreds of creepy stories about these guys in the muslim world, ranging from black magic gone wrong, to being in the wrong place and the wrong time. However, most aren't like this, and keep to themselves.

Riba- An arabic word pertaining to bank interest, it's one of the worst sins a muslim can commit, making most muslims conscious of their pocketbooks for the most part. For most muslims, its seen as the age old, "rich guy gets richer, poor guy gets poorer", circus clown scheme.

Heading back to capsule Corp, the three of us were enveloped in an awkward silence. I mean, when one of those people in knocked out, and I'm sitting on the second person, which happens to be a mute magic cloud, one didn't have much of the luxury of conversation. **Amma, ye kitna bayzaar he**! (How boring this is!), I moaned inwardly.

At this time, the slime had started to groan and wobble about like a dish of floppy custard. The nimbus and I both felt the vibrations and were both shocked. Judging from his bruises, he had sat and beaten upon for a good half hour, yet here he was, looking good as new. _Perhaps slime anatomy has a self-regeneration component built in like the nameks_...; I mused, though not before a voice spoke out, breaking my thoughts.

" Uhhh... What slime is it?"

The nimbus, though flying us both visibly contorted in confusion, the ruffling texture of his cloudiness creasing my now slightly unkempt garments.

However, I had prepared myself for this. Dragon Quest was infamous for having puns muttered through its text, and the slimes were no exception, often using the words goo, slurp or slime in their vernacular, though with significant tone shifts depending on the word being punned.

"The time, oh my that is quite a good question..." I said quietly, looking above to the broiling sun for an answer.

"Hmm... judging from the sun's position, and this incessant heat, I'd guess it's 3 in the afternoon. Sheesh, summers are like Saudi here! AND IT DOESN'T HELP THAT I PARASOLED HERE IN MY PAJAMAS!" I screamed, motioning at my slightly diminutive short, and my sleeping short shirt, which happened to be my only clothes.

"Oh my gooodness, I totally forgot to ask, slurp! Just where are we? Oh and thanks for the rescue!" the slime hopped up and down, smile evident on his face.

Letting out a light laugh, I responded, "Oh it wasn't much! By the way, we are not in our normal universes. We've been what I like to call, "parasoled through"."

Its brows furrowed in thought, the slime spoke again after much contemplation, "Hmmm...his majesty did say something about how we were falling from the sky holding onto umbrellas..."

Now it was my turn to furrow, as I spoke with apprehension, "Wait if you're working with your ruler... who were those guys that were beating the living guts out of you? They looked like standard army footer."

At this, the slime looked like it was going to ulti, or, in other words, vomit all over, eyes literally glistening with anxiety. It appeared that I had put my hand where I didn't belong, and boy, do I have a bad habit of doing that!

"They're a rival faction of the military. Recently, we slurped into here and made a new state in... Erm, I think it was called Korin... There's a gooreat big tower there!"

"You guys landed over there?! Then how did you guys get over here? Did someone have a chimera wing on hand?" I stated with awe. The nimbus was also ruffled in impressment, for being able to cover the distance from Korin to here was no easy task.

"Yeah, one of us had it, but now that you gave them a glooping big whack, they probably ran away. I was planning on slurping it and getting home."

"Hmm...well it seems like that's hit a bit of a rusty corner. Tell you what, we'll go to my place, but first let's hit the bank. If we can go and convert the gold into zeni and make an account, we'll have a nice saving place. There's no need to play the half off game."

At this, both the slime and the nimbus slightly nodded in approval. "You're right. If we slick off any longer, were all goomed. Now, where in nadiria is that bank?!" the slime screamed out.

"I'm looking for it calm down! Nimbus stop screwing around and give us a third a pair of eyes. By the way, what's your name, I never got it."

"Slalin, and keep your eyes open! We don't need to ooze the banks area!"

"Zain, and sheesh, no need to yell, were already here! Nimbus, take us down!" I shrieked out in the summer sky. The nimbus let us down, though not before making me fall on my face as we descended, as it turned a light shade of blue as if it were dying of laughter. _I'll get you yet you_... I schemed, though not before slalin called again.

"Zain, Nimbus, come in already! I'm about to turn into a puddle here!" a visibly strained slalin looked at us with daggers as he held the door. Taking the signal, both I and the magic cloud scuttled in, already getting stares by the bucketful from the employees. _Great, it's only been ten seconds and we're already getting eyeballed. So much for homelessness and anonymity_... I thought.

Ignoring the stares, I walked up to the front desk and asked her about the currency exchange department of the bank, as well as its whereabouts. Pointing to the left side of the building, we briskly walked there.

As we did, however, schemes of conversion were reveling mad in our heads, each of us betting on a certain zeni value.

"20 imaginary bucks that it's over a half a million zeni!" I shouted, hemming in my chance. You see, gambling was a strict no-no from where I come from, but it can't be called gambling when your'e going in with nothing to begin with, am I right?

"Dibs on 2 million zeni. You'd better be able to eat your words fool!" slalin called snidely, while the nimbus affirmed with his bet with a nod, dittoing on slalin.

"Hmph, if that's how you guys wanna be, but don't get mad when you get it wrong!" I replied, as we finally made it to the conversion area.

A woman was there to welcome as, and was we brought ourselves up to stand; she at first had a concerning look on her, no doubt due to our harried appearance.

"I'm sorry, but this isn't the place for kids like you! My goodness, you look terrible! she cried, her eyes dripping with concern.

I didn't want her to feel worried, so I decided to comfort her down, "It's quite alright, in fact, I'm here to make a currency exchange. Pardon me for my erm...looks. ", I said with a bit of embarrassment.

However, what did strike me as odd was that she hadn't freaked out over slalin. Come to think of it, nobody had. _Maybe the people here are just used to this... I mean, this world does have the existence of a freaking physic defying dragon_ , I mused.

But my thoughts were cut short by the clinking of a register. Fumbling in my pocket for the coins, still with a filmy coating of fresh slime innards on their heads and tails, I handed them over.

She inspected them, but not before the look of suspicions descended upon her face like the falling sunlight. "And where exactly did you get these coins?" she spoke, her voice slightly wagering. T _aking me for a petty chor, a money nabber of baseness, are we? My goodness_..., I moaned inwardly with a hint of spitefulness. _It hadn't been an hour since I was fighting to save someone's life... and now this?! Qadr really must have something in comic sans in my book_..., I thought inwardly.

Hesitantly opening my mouth to speak, my voice was cut off by slalin, "Look, miss. This boy saved my slime and that clouds hide less than an hour ago from dying in the dump. Cut him some slack, will ya?" he said, bluntness evident in his words.

The woman looked at me with a slightly shocked look, though not before turning her attention to the nimbus. He simply nodded his "face" area vigorously up and down. Taking these testimonies to be fact, she took the coins and weighed them. Lights zapped, metal clinked, and dialogs popped up with numbers. All of us were in avid anticipation, wanting money to survive just as much as to win the bet.

Her eyes widened even more, however, as she was busy. _Have we, broken the bank with this one?,_ I mused as I smirked inwardly in my horribly pun-riddled thoughts.

Motioning her finger, she simply could utter seven words, the coins having gone and clamped her throat shut like a steel trap, "Could you come over here for a minute, please? she motioned with shaking fingers.

Curious, we all moved toward the exchange machine, and as my feet clacked on the tiles, so did my head, curiosity running in like hot blood. We could only stare with eyes as big as andas, round and oval-like like the eggs they were, to see that we were all wrong. The dialog was stuck at 450,000 zeni! _Crapbaskets, we were all wrong! Ah well, at least now nobody has bragging rights!_ I thought ecstatically.

At this, the lady at the machine, eyes widened beyond belief, nearly fell off her high chair, quite literally, only being able to splutter out the numerical value.

"Miss, could you tell me what you could buy with this money amount? Your eyes look like grapefruits, my goodness!" I stated, slalin and nimbus standing behind me. As I turned around, I was absolutely shocked. Not due to their vigorous head shaking in my favor, but rather how they looked, slalin particularly.

Slalin, who once looked like a typical blue teardrop, now was a songstress with a flute by her side. I was already shocked that she was a girl; she didn't even act girly in any way! Clad in cyan blue robes, and with long black hair, and a light complexion, let's just say, I'm more than certain this slime had been approached by many a suitor back home. I never thought she was a songstress, though, or a girl, now that was some quirk right there, she acted incredibly boyish, although to be honest, that's a tomboy, and those exist, and slimes are gender ambiguous, so that's not entirely my fault! _Her voice must be liquid gold when she sings!_ I gaped inwardly. Nimbus, on the other hand, was still a cloud. I'm simply guessing here, but after goku's fling with it when he was a kid, no innuendo intended, I'd be dumb if I didn't say people got used to it somehow. Either that or Mr. Satan decided to blab about it, I honestly don't know which.

"What is it, jeez? You look like you've been hit in the slime!", she spoke, with not even a trace of eloquence, betraying her clearly experienced vocal chords, shocked out of my staring, as I realized my eyes had gotten glazed over from shock.

"Uhh. it's nothing! Anyway, back to you Miss! How much can that buy you anyway, you looked like the amount was so big, and Shangri-La would be a shack compared to it! ", I slightly laughed a bit too loud, getting a bit too buzzed on adrenaline from the anticipation.

Finally managing to get out of her vocal choke hold, she stated with a wavering voice, "T… that's almost a years' worth of wages in a white collar job, low-level, but this must be the find of the century!"

At this, my mind began to plot, as a commerce-imbued smile crept onto my face. Now that we had enough money to do things, if we saved it up and waited long enough, I could become as rich as the sun! Of course, bank accounts were another dilemma, for I didn't exactly want riba, that crawling financial terror, to come snaking down my money. I just hoped they had an interest-free account really, but finding one of those is like trying to find a needle in a haystack! _Ah well, I won't be able to know if I don't ask might as well give it a shot! Who knows, maybe fate might just have a mystery block ready for me! Sure hope this doesn't turn into a poison shroom scenario, though…_ , I thought, my face grimacing at the potential results. But then I realized I couldn't open one. Not only was I not of legal age, I didn't have any paperwork to make any if I did. We'd simply have to get a cloth satchel and put them there for the time being, unfortunately for our safety.

"Oh, umm could you convert the money for us, please? We would really appreciate that." I stated, driving the point home.

The teller nodded, and quick as a wink, she had given us over 450k zeni. I began to walk out, trying to fish it into a backpack, motioning for slalin and nimbus to follow, the disappointment laced in my eyes like oil in water communicating that we wouldn't find a safe box for the money, bring out two loud groans from them, though not before the teller opened her mouth, trying to say something, but quickly shut it fast. With that settled, we left the bank, although I was left somewhat worried, for what did the teller truly want to say? Her mouth may have been sealed, but her eyes, like all others, told a thousand words.

However, it had taken a really long time, now that I looked at the sky. It was nearly five, and late afternoon prayers were to start soon. If I couldn't get back home, I wouldn't have an area to make them! Not to mention, but we were sitting ducks here with all of this cash!

"Aree! Ham ko chale jana he ya se! Slalin, nimbus pe upar jao!" (Oh, my, we need to get out of here! Slalin, get on the Nimbus!" I screeched, to the puzzlement of slalin. Motioning for her to get on Nimbus, due to her puzzled look, she hopped on, though not before nearly tripping on her dress, as I snickered inwardly remembering all the times I had nearly tripped on a thope in my years, that white tunic was the angel to dress in during the summer, but running in them was like tangoing with a shaytani! Also, I really needed to stop switching into languages. With the money out of the way, we flew home, all of us silent for the coming night, with its leaden-blue sky, diamond-esque stars that could pierce through time and space, and the silver sheen of the moon.


	4. Chapter 4: Busted Secrets

**Authors Note:**

 **Phew, this has got to be the longest chapter I've ever written! Don't worry if I've been boring you guys with my oc's that was just introduction of the characters. The Z-fighters finally make a show in this chapter, and the real fun is soon to come! Just bear with me, will ya? Also, for anybody getting peeved as to why the z-fighters haven't popped up sooner, it's due to this. I plan to make this story as realistic as possible and most self-insert fanfics, with their whole "I don't know who you are, but you know everything about us, let's be friends, no suspicions." don't make sense. There are some like DWMW that actually go into depth with this, and that's what I'm planning to do here. But don't worry, this whole oc binge won't be lasting for long, in fact, it's ending this chapter. From after this, there will be chapter sections for both the z-fighters and me and my compatriots.**

 **Word Glossary:**

 **Qurbani: The Islamic word for the sacrifice held on Eid Al-Adha, the second Islamic holiday of the year, to commemorate Abraham's sacrifice of his son, or at least his attempt to**

 **Toph/toup- A typically white, but also can be other colors, long robe, it's mainly worn in the Arabian Peninsula, but some Muslims, especially from what I've seen of Indian Muslims, wear it to the mosque on Fridays**

 **Sawm- Arabic Word for fasting**

 **Tamil- A language spoken on the Indian Subcontinent**

 **Mandhir- The Urdu word for a temple, specifically use in reference to Hindu temples**

 **Kurtas- A kind of upper garb worn in the Indian Subcontinent, and typically used by men**

 **Saris- A long cloth wrapped around the body, used by women in India**

 **Shahsharwals- A kind of festive dress used in India**

 **Bhangra- One of the dance forms of India, and one of the most popular**

 **Lassi- A kind of smoothie, it's generally made with mangoes (aam in Urdu) in India**

 **Kitab- Urdu word for book**

 **Dunya- an Arabic word often used in religious context, its meaning is as "This world", specifically the world of the living**

 **Juhte- the Urdu word for slaps, often used in slang for corporal punishment**

And so, life had settled into a rather odd routine for the three of us. Since monsters were practically everywhere, we could rack up at least 10 gold coins a day, gaining experience in the battle and toughening ourselves up. With all of this money, bank trips became an almost daily occurrence, and for the people working there, we heard whispers that we were a credit spring. It was almost like the guy upstairs had decided to write in our books in liquid gold, cash signs included, a long while back. We would come back to the tree to rest up, go downtown for food, and the process started over again. Although, I never really figured out how Slalin pulled a gijinka, I'm guessing this world's laws of reality forced her body into a more "real" form, but that's just conjecture.

However, back to our money, while we were technically vagabonds with a dollar too many and frugal too, that isn't to say we splurged a little to delight our whims and fancy. Occasionally, we would have lunch at a restaurant once a week, and would buy new clothes from time to time. We also managed to avoid getting caught by the Briefs all this time, a great blessing if there was ever one. The last roadblock I need god to throw at me is the z-fighters, but I knew he wouldn't, for while we may have had a lot of money, we tended to live rather simply, the tree in the Capsule Corp residence being our home, to avoid undue attention. Of course, all this money business didn't go unnoticed by the bank, and a week after our first conversion, the teller that had dealt with us had opened an account in her name for our use, fearing that by carrying all the money around, we would become living golden geese for the Qurbani. With that issue solved, our lives continued blissfully, sure there was some difficulty, but that's what life's about. Of course, life decided right after to send a dead letter our way, and people we really shouldn't have met!

Let me explain, though, cuz you're probably scratching your head like a dog with fleas. It all started about a week ago when we found out a bit too much about Slalin…

0o0o0o0o

It had been a slightly balmy Friday, or at least I thought it was, marking the start of our second week. I had by now, gotten a new pair of clothes, a jean, and a gray toph from the Indian quarter to be precise, mainly to deal with the heat. Sure I couldn't exactly run in it without gripping on the tonic like a fool, but it did look good. Slalin had swapped her blue robes for a skirt and a short shirt, blue of course, hair loose and flowy, while my hair was as unkempt as ever, and the nimbus the same as before. Carrying around a few hundred zeni as pocket change, slalin and I hopped on the nimbus and rode to the Indian quarter of the city, as I had persuaded them to try some food. Since we would eat a few lychees and some water most of the time, staying concealed in the tree all the while, Fridays were a day of reckless feasting from the pent up sawm of the week. Last week it had been some sub store, but I was simply too homesick that day, I needed some remembering of home and what better way to do that than food?

However, Slalin was not so much on the happy boat with me; she was getting a gas mask ready. After trying to paint a picture of Indian food to her, she had literally gone psychotic on fear, thinking her head would blow like old faithful.

"Are you out of your slime?! There's no way I'm eating that!" she screeched, terror descending on her like a hawk.

"Look Slalin, it's only a couple of chilis. They won't kill you. Besides, I'll be asking them to lower the heat range."

At this Slalin, face slapped with a sarcastic smile, could only balk, "oh yes, tell that to people that can't speak English! Face it; you're trying to dig me an early grave!"

At this the nimbus and I started laughing, the nimbus making a high whistling sound, and my voice breaking octave ranges like a hammer on glass, going from boy to witch shaytani in less than half a minute.

"AHAHAHAHAHAAHH! YOU REALLY….. AHAHAHAHHAHAHHAH!" I laughed, as nimbus's whistling grew ever louder.

Fuming like a volcano frothing for an eruptions release, she tapped her foot impatiently, "AND JUST WHAT EXACTLY IS SO FUNNY ABOUT THIS YOU TWO?! MY SLIME IS IN DANGER HERE!"

Regaining our composite, we got on the nimbus, Slalin raving like a rabid dog on how we should get a casket ready for her, as I laughed and the nimbus whistles all the way to the Indian quarter, the sun shining on us like happiness concentrated.

0o0o0o0o

Within a couple minutes, we finally reached the desired ethnic enclave. The first way to figure out you were actually there, was by smell, by far. As soon as you walked about in the streets, the unmistakable odor of curry and oil hit you like a freight train. There was also talking, and a lot of it wasn't even in English, typical for such a place, ranging from Hindi to Tamil. There were mandhirs and mosques scattered about, some blaring put Arabic calls for prayer, others whose doors barely concealed blaring sermons in Sanskrit. The streets were slightly narrow and filled to the brim with people. You saw people walking away in saris, function goers leaving with their kurtas and their shasharwals, not to mention the saris, women sporting hijabs, men leaving the mosques in toupes and simple western clothes, not to mention the bhangra performance happening across the street. In short, it felt like an odd home for me, and I couldn't feel any happier.

Landing near the neighborhood entrance, Slalin and I both hopped off, as the nimbus then proceeded to follow us in suit. You see, while the nimbus couldn't eat per se, it was still a cloud, so anything with water content and being a liquid was fair game. He had come so that I could swipe a glass of **am ki lassi** (mango smoothie) for him, which basically meant, in layman's terms, "pay for me cuz I don't have hands." Unlike Slalin, he had been spellbound by this exotic food and decided to tag along, not because of friendships totalitarian majorities, but rather out of curiosity. Slalin meanwhile was still grumbling all the way to the restaurant, a little place called Desi Galaxy, fitting for such a futuristic era, yet it still kept that old charm. Inside, it was downright boisterous, waiters running up and down the aisles, men and women chatting about their day over a hot plate of idlis, at other tables some curry puffs, or even a simple duo of chai cups.

"Hmm… so this is what you have brought us to. I'll have to say, the fact that I'm not goomed by the smell is hardly reassuring, but it's still something. But what's with the gooreat amount of people here?! I've never seen such revelry before!" said Slalin as she walked in with a gaping mouth, balking at what the establishment had served for her eyes. It had occurred to me that the outside decor of the building may have been a duller to her anticipation levels, but not to this extent I had thought!

"Ah…. you see Slalin. Never judge a kitab by its cover. This dunya is full of surprises." I said a smile that looked fit for a sage crawling onto my face.

"You know… I still don't get whatever the nadiria you mean by that, but I get the jist." Slalin stated, her shock finally beginning to recede, though not before we bumped into someone.

" **Oy! Baccha! Apki enke pagal hoge?!** (Oi! Kid! Did your eyes go dumb?!)", the man cried out.

Embarrassed, I hastily crafted up an apology, to avoid any unnecessary trouble. You see, the thing is, India is a place where you kinda have to show respect to adults, and I'm not talking like the western model where you just call them mister or miss and then proceed to screw with them. I'm talking full obedience to whatever seems sane, no ifs, buts or whys about it, lest you want to get some juhte upside the head, and an apology for any sort of wrong was expected from a younger perpetrator. Sure, some fumbles were overlooked, but it's best to be cautious. Better safe than sorry, you know?

" **Ai! Me sorry hu!** (Ai! I'm sorry!) ", I replied, silently hoping for no repercussions.

The man gruffly humphed and looked away, as we saw that in front of him, stretched a considerably long queue. It wasn't the Great Wall of China mind you, but it could have given the big apple's traffic a run for its money given how slow it was moving! Each person was taking almost 2 minutes to get out of the line, food in hand, and given that there were 20 people in front, it was going to take a long time.

"Well, Slalin, welcome to natural life, where fate just loves long lines for some reason!" I moaned, careful not to sound like a pissy brat by toning the words just right. You see, that's another thing for Indians. Say one word one way and you can save yourself a lot of trouble if you sugarcoat it just right, but say it in the wrong accent or pitch, and you've got fire and brimstone in store for your future.

"Yeah, it's alright I mean, I can wait…. oh my goodness!" Slalin immediately cried out, earning us a few stares from a couple people, much to my dismay.

"What, what is it? Also, keep your voice down; people are starting to peep at us." I said, elbowing her in case she didn't get the message."

But when I did look at her after I elbowed her, I saw that this was no ordinary incident. Her eyes looked like they had been opened wide with some kind of scalpel being stuck to the bottom of her eyes. Her legs had gone stiff, and she refused to move, looking close to buckling under her own weight.

"Uh… Earth to Slalin, are you all right up there? Seriously, say something dangit." I stated, trying to veer her attention back to me

Seeming to have regained control over her body and psyche, she managed to straighten herself up, and the glares focused on us finally melted away. _Thank goodness for that, otherwise we might have gotten kicked out for looking funny_! I thought, my ease without term. With that, the line went on, Slalin and I shuffled foot by foot forward, the nimbus stayed in the sky above the shop waiting, and life went on.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Eventually, after a long time of waiting, we finally managed to get to the top of the line, and gained access to the counter for orders to be placed. Our legs were sore beyond belief, and they screamed for rest. Maybe I was going soft, but considering I was homeless right now, maybe the stress had finally kicked in, who knows really?

" **Kya apku hona aj?** (What do you want today?)", the women staffing the counter said, waiting for a response

" **Hm…. do masala dose or ek am ki lassi, please** (Hm… two masala dosas and one mango lassi, please)." I replied in advance. The last thing I needed was the death stare for holding the line back!

" **Tik he. Thorisi rush he aj, das minutes dijie khana ke lie**. (Alright, there's some rush today, give ten minutes for the food)", she replied. With that, we stood fast and waited for our glorious food to come home. But all that spare time was starting to give me opportunities to ferment questions in the yeast laboratory of my brain. _What was Slalin so unnerved about? An old friend from the army, or is this something else entirely?_ I pondered.

Eventually, after the ten minutes were up, our food indeed was ready, and so we got out of the line and were heading for the door, though not before Slalin tugged on the side of my toup.

"Zain… can you wait for a slicond here? I'll be right back, just you know it!" she cried, and then scurried over to a man in a corner of the establishment.

However, as she scurried over to him, I took and empty seat in front of the unlikely duo of known and unknown, which had luckily been vacated only a minute ago, as I began to listen in on their conversation.

"...the Throne….."

"I can't do that!"

"...Possessed?"

"Come back."

With this, the conversation quickly ended, and I dunked my head toward my lassi to give myself an alibi, as the mystery man quickly walked away. I scuttled out as soon as I had put some distance between himself and me, just to make sure nothing suspicious looked like it was occurring, and to not get Slalin suspicious herself. _It appears that there are secrets closer to home than I thought…. just who are you Slalin?_ I thought with a calculating cold stare. While Slalin had not lied, she hadn't told me enough, something far more unnerving. With this dismal, doubting mindset, I left the land of spicy happiness, to go back to the boring conundrum of the lychees.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

With this, I called for the nimbus, though not before dunking the remaining lassi into nimbus itself. It jumped up and down, seeming to want to express its delight over what it had just consumed. We both got on, and away we flew. The ride back, however, was much less jovial than the ride here, the air literally feeling like it was electrified with tension. Slalin was not who she was, and I was determined to find out who the heck she was. Slalin had also figure out that I wasn't going to play quiet, her thumbs twiddling round and round, and sweat beginning to bead up on her skin. Even the nimbus decided to stay quiet, or at least, tried not to impart any action to convey its thoughts. We were all questioning, and the mood was full of distrust.

However, that was cut short when we finally managed to land down near the Capsule Corp tree we called home. Each of us got off, and the nimbus whisked itself to our little home. I took my book pack and my parasol off, and put them in the branches of the tree, so caught up in the commotion, I forgot I had been wearing them, my frying pan also safely kept inside the bag in case of attack. We all climbed up, and sat down, asking with our eyes, who would have the courage to pipe up first.

"Alright then, Slalin, just what haven't you told us? Clearly, that mystery man wasn't no coincidence, huh? Just who or what are you?" I said, my face trying to hide the look of betrayal it was begging to pose. I didn't want to call her out on it, perhaps she really needed to conceal her identity due to crisis, but I needed to know. We were a team, after all.

"Alright then, I was afraid it was going to ooze to this. The thing is, in that small land of Korin, I'm a high official, really up there. The war has got me on pins and needles, and the army has been trying to kidnap me for leverage. That's what you guys saw the day you met me. I'm not required alive either, in fact, they've wanted me dead for a while to demoralize my people into surrendering. I'm afraid that might be happening soon, though, even if I'm not dead." she spoke grimly, worry etched onto her face like ink on parchment.

"Wait, what do you mean soon? Has there been a turning point in the war? There haven't been major threats on civilians, have there?" I spoke, as the nimbus and I both perked our attention to her. Judging from her situation and how we found her, it was obvious she had fled from wartime persecution, but this was starting to sound like more than just a simple scuffle.

"If I don't come back, they'll extinguish the castle town, and burn it to the ground, that's what the man that spoke to me said; he's a friend of mine from the covert operators. They won't be taking prisoners either. It's either I die to protect my people, or I live and they die." she stated, her sorrow evident in her near bursting tears.

I could barely manage to speak, as her figure finally cracked, and she was wracked with sobs. But, if there was one thing I could do, it was to help her. To do anything else would not only be cowardly, it would be sinful beyond belief. One does not simply turn away from a person in need, it just isn't right.

"Alright then, we'll come with you." I spoke, my voice wavering not even by an inch.

At first, Slalin seemed happy over such news, but her eyes widened considerably after weighing the consequence of what I was proposing, "No… No, you can't be doing that! You'll be signing your own death warrant!"

Simply sighing, I said in return, "Look, I know it's dangerous. We might all die. But to see you just go there and offer yourself to the cross and get paraded around is not only cowardly but just plain wrong. We're coming with you and that's that. We are a team after all, no matter how stupid we are." I replied, the nimbus nodding in agreement

Tears dripping out of her eyes, she managed a smile, "Th...Thank you. I'm grateful to have friends like you."

With a simple hug, I now spoke anew, with a vibrant vigor on my face, "Now then, who wants to hear some funny stories about the z-fighters?"

The nimbus and Slalin both perked up at this, their anticipation at the ready. I had told them stories before about the world we were in, ranging from Goku's madness at the world tournaments, their fiasco with the red ribbon army and the like. Today, however, was going to be the day that I was going to tell them the full story, starting with a young girl on a quest to find the man of her dreams….

0o0o0o0o

It was now the afternoon and Bulma Breifs was tired. Deprivated of sleep, in fact, for the party they were having today at the residence had been rather…. hectic. Trunks and Goten had both tried to nab the dragon radar again to get the dragon balls, and had Goku not caught them in time, they would have literally wished for a pile of video games to play in advance for the holidays, and kami knows what else. Vegeta suddenly had gotten real pissed at something, and it had taken all her mental patience to make sure he didn't blow something up, and the oven had nearly exploded an hour ago due to a technical difficulty. But it was well worth it, her friends more than made up for all that craziness.

"So, Bulma, I heard you just managed to knock off a counterfeit company that had been managing to steal your products for a decade. That must have been some search in the papers!" Chi-Chi prattled, trying to strike up a conversation

"You have no idea. I went through three corporate lawyers trying to turn the case in my favor, and one of them turned out to be a backstabber! It was just such a royal pain in the ass!" Bulma groaned, grimacing at the recently passed debacle

"Well, at least you did manage to catch them. Never thought you had that in you, you know. When you need something, you really can get feisty you know." 18 called out, as she sipped up some juice

"Please, you think that was feisty. Ask Goku about how I was back in the day. I nearly killed Krillin when he took my shirt off to Roshi blood smear one of Baba's invisible fighters!" Bulma laughed, reminiscing the past

"Oh my, Krillin did that?! He was such a sweet kid back in the day! I never thought he had it in him!" Launch exclaimed, good side, of course, slightly gaping

"Oh, Krillin did that, did he? It appears I may have to have a talk with him." 18 stated in reply, a frosty expression beginning to envelope her face.

Bulma, somewhat a little scared for Krillin's fate, decided to go up and talk to some of the guys. It had been a while since she had talked to Goku and the old gang, and she was definitely nostalgic for some old company.

"Hey Goku, how's it going!" Bulma, exclaimed, hoping to gain Goku's attention as he stuffed his fourth chicken down. The saiyans, along with their ridiculous metabolism rate, never ceased to amaze her.

"Oh, hey Bulma! How's it going! Me, I'm basically been fishing and training goten from time to time, while keeping the farm going, it's been pretty boring if you ask me. No fights, not even an adventure like when we were kids!" goku replied, groaning out of boredom

"Yeah, I do miss those days. But we're all grown up now, there's no time…. If only we could just… you know, be kids again, just for a while." Bulma reminisced.

"Bulma, long time no see! How's it hanging!" cried Yamcha, as he walked up to Bulma

"Oh, you know... same old same old. Nothing but paperwork for me really. Been kinda boring really." she repeated

"Yeah, it's been on the down-low for me too. Puar and I have been getting a lot of jobs for the bodyguard services, but it's just starting to get real old. We really need a break, something new to do.", he said

With this, Bulma, Goku, and Yamcha decided to do what they did best, talk about the past and their adventures. From the Red Ribbon Army, crushing Emperor Pilaf three times, Fortuneteller Baba's tournament, the actual martial arts tournament, King Piccolo, you name it, it was all there. Goku was in the middle of telling them about a locale called Penguin Village, though not before Trunks came up to them, with Goten not far behind.

"Mama! Did you ever show your underwear to Goku when you were younger?" Trunks said, his bluntness shocking the receiving trio

With this, Goten also piped up, "Oh Dad! Did you really not know the difference between a boy and a girl?"

Bulma nearly spit out her drink, and all conversation between her, Goku and Yamcha practically ceased. These were events that had occurred nearly two decades ago, how could it be that Trunks and Goten, who knew only what they told them, know such embarrassing moments about their lives?

"T..Trunks, where did you hear that from?" Bulma called out, her voice slightly wavering

"Goten, how did you?" was the only thing coming out of Yamcha's and Goku's mouths, their brains literally going dead from the sentence

"Oh, did you meet a girl named Arale, she spuossedly head-butted some guy you were fighting called General Blue! Who's Mercenary Tao? Also, what is with Piccolo's dad? He sounds like he was really evil!", Trunks and Goten both said, excitement evident on their lips, directed towards Goku this time.

By this point, nearly everybody at the party had quite literally stopped in their tracks. Trunks had a fairly wide voice, and everybody had heard the secrets, secrets that were decades old, and privy to only some. Krillin's and Launch's eyes widened like saucers, and Roshi and Baba looked flabbergasted. Tien and Chiatzou had a horrified expression, past crimes resurfacing in their minds while Chi-Chi looked almost dead, her mind was not being able to comprehend, and Vegeta had nearly spat out his food when he heard mention of Bulma. Piccolo had actually gotten closer to the party at the sound of his father's name, something very few knew about, and even fewer knew about what his connection with him.

"Oh, we forgot to tell you who was telling those things! There's this boy in the front yard of the house who was saying all this stuff about you guys! Something about a giant monkey, some Ribbon Army, and some really stupid emperor!" Trunks called to his mother

"G...Goku? Do you want to…?" Bulma called, slightly wavering. Whoever this person was, they clearly knew too much. Could this boy be an apprentice to one of the many foes they had faced? Such was the question that floated through the minds of the z-fighters.

"I'll go, Bulma. Besides, I kinda wanna meet this kid, he sure sounds interesting. Who knows, this could be our big break!" Goku exclaimed smile plastered on his face.

But he wasn't the only one who got up; rather the whole party literally got on their legs and moved north to the front yard. The day was surely unveiling a surprise, and as the sun ticked away in the sky, the boy was going to have to put his mouth where his hand was, and pay penance for his blabbermouth tendencies.

 **Well, that's that! Next you'll be seeing the cumbersome introduction of us and the z-fighters. Hate to hate on a cliffhanger, but hey, that's an author's intuition for ya! Comment and Review! Hopefully, I haven't been boring you guys with these 3 chapters, I just needed them for story setup. Stay patient with me, okay?**


	5. Chapter 5:Muffin Button

**Hey Guys, I'm back! So just for future reference, this is going to be on a monthly update schedule sequence from now on, once a week is just getting to be too overkill. Anyway Here's Chapter 5! Dragon Ball is a work of Akira Toriyama only, not mine! Also, all TFS jokes are there's alone.**

 **Word Guide**

 **Lal Mirchi- A kind of red curry powder**

 **Ham marjare aaj- Short for we're going to die**

The z-fighters continued to walk toward the front of the yard, uncertainty laced in their steps. Sure, they had faced things that you wouldn't believe, genocidal androids, a perfectionist biomechanical crazy, angry aliens, you name it. But none had struck so… personally compared to the boy they would soon see.

"Papa, why are we all going to meet this boy?" Trunks asked eyebrow cocked in confusion

"To destroy him of course. Someone with that much knowledge cannot be a simple weakling. Personally, I'm looking toward to it. I'll be able to teach the best what it means to mess with a Saiyans hunger. And you better be able to land a better punch than Goten if you have too, Trunks." Vegeta replied, blunt like usual.

"You know, maybe he's not trying to kill us Vegeta. He could just be a boy, like Trunks and gotten said. And beating him up because you're hungry is possibly the worst excuse you've ever had." Bulma said, trying to calm down her now slightly agitated husband.

"Hn.", was all that Vegeta responded as to that statement, grown pressed ok his face.

"Well, I for one want to know how this boy managed to gather all this information on us. He must've been very resourceful to do so, after all, we trashed Gero's lab years ago" Piccolo slightly snarled out, breaking his usual silence

"If he really is this smart, he might give Bulma a run for her money!" Yamcha stated, his tomfoolery grin evident.

"You know what Yamcha, you tell me that when he's helped in saving the world more than once", Bulma replied, angry sneer evident, as Yamcha sheepishly tried to back off.

"Honestly, I don't buy it. He's probably just making up stories about us. He could be one of those supporters", Tien replied

"Tien, I don't think that's it. He knows things most normal people shouldn't know.. Our past, our personalities. Who knows, he might even know the future for all we know.", Chiatzou mentioned, face now drooping as past crimes rolled into his head, Tien doing so as well, though only until Launch spoke up.

"Look, Tien, you're not a bad person, not anymore, I know that, we all know that. Besides, if he really knew about you, wouldn't he know you were a hero, a person that changed for the better. Stop letting this guy get to your head." Launch soothingly replied as she placed her hand on Tien's shoulder

If only I could tell Vegeta that. That boy is probably going to inflate his already sky high ego…., Bulma thought annoyed.

Everyone was busy, lost in anticipating thoughts until Goten caught a glimpse and shrieked shrilly.

"Mom! Here he is!", though not before being silenced by his mom's hand over his mouth, as the z fighters began to listen on to the boys prattling, oblivious to his sight.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

While all this was happening, however, I was busy retelling the tale of dragon ball, a very abridged one at that, TFS included. From the poking order to Yamcha's failures, the senzus, Frieza's almighty idiocy, every character flaw known to man, and the plague of fanfiction that had descended upon the internet, some good some bad of course, I finally finished in fifteen minutes time.

"Whelp, that's the story, any questions?"

At once, Slalin shot her hand up, almost as if she was a child at a school, and I her teacher. "Wait. So if that's really the story, how are they now?"

Putting my fingers on my chin, I pondered for a few. "Well…. It's hard to say. There's a new anime coming out, db super, that continues the story, but that's almost 4 years from now. Age-wise however, all the original z-fighters are probably in their mid-30's. Their adventure days are definitely over. There isn't going to be much of a threat, I mean they did get rid of buu after all, but I would still insist that we didn't go up and meet them." I stated.

Confused, as I expected, she questioned, "But why can't we? They seem sooo awesome!"

"Yes they definitely are quite the motley crew, but the fact of the day is, is that we know stuff about them that no person should know, and the fact that were not even from her further complicated matters. Think about it, if they just find us babbling their life stories away, they may take us for a hostile who got a little too drunk on curiosity. One of their former foes collected data on them for years, they could very well lump us in the same category, and they are not ones to talk."

"Awww! But I really want to!" Slalin whines, much like a young girl

"And I would too, but when our lives could be potentially cut if we do, I'd prefer to not gamble my life away in Russian roulette."

The nimbus suddenly taking an interest in the way the conversation was going, nodded in agreement. Meanwhile, Slalin was busy pondering eyes closed deep in thought

"So what should we do in case we accidently meet them? We have to have a plan, am I right?" she said

"Good idea actually, but…" my thoughts were instantly shattered as I heard a noise.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Goten, don't move around! The boy heard you!" Chi Chi whispered angrily, smacking him in the head with her magically metastasizing frying pan

"Chi Chi! You can't do that!" Goku whispered, eyes wide

Normally, by now Chi Chi would have argued with Goku, but right now was an exception, as she locked her lips.

"Idiots.", Vegeta murmured, tired of the charade that they had played. Judging from the boy's expression, he had heard very well. The harpy's folly had very likely cost them their prey.

"I can't believe that boy called me old! When I get my hands on him..." Bulma seethed, her face red like lal mirchi

"SHUT UP BULMA!" the Z-fighters whispered collectively, as Bulma became quiet once more, realizing the consequences of her actions.

0o0o0o0o

Startled suddenly, I managed to regain my composure, as a disturbing revelation began to crawl into my thoughts.

"Slalin, we aren't alone," I stated, my voice no higher than a whisper.

Slalin nodded slowly, as she gingerly began to gather our supplies. The money satchel, extra clothes, and with the help of the nimbus, fished out my backpack and parasol. We began to gingerly walk out, not making a sound. However, it struck me odd that nobody was coming after us; after all, I could have sworn I had heard a noise no less than a minute ago. Slalin took her satchel, and hiding behind the tree, quickly changed her clothes back into the robes she came in, for disguise purposes. Clutching her weapon, which happened to be a light iron pole she had excavated from some of the scrap metal we had found at the dump she had nearly died in, as well as a satchel of her own, we slowly got aboard the nimbus. Escape was right within our reach, but things don't work that easy, now do they?

0o0o0o0o0o

Meanwhile, Vegeta was getting agitated beyond words. The women was simply sitting around, debating on what to do, and the harpy wasn't much better either, and neither were the rest of the pathetic weaklings here. Once again, he had to lift the heavy weight.

"Apparently, none of you have the guts to go meet this kid. Pathetic. I suppose it falls on me to deal with someone that the lot of you could knock out with a mere tap." Vegeta said, snarling over the loss of food he was currently experiencing.

However, at this, Goku stood up and interceded, "Look Vegeta, hate to break it to you, but you probably couldn't talk to him. You are kind of… well… you."

Scoffing, Vegeta said in earnest, "Feh. Make sure to get this over with quickly Kakarot."

Goku nodded, and thus, began the walk to the front yard, and with him, the entire party once again dragged its legs, murmuring like a pack of angry cicadas.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Finally managing to pack everything up, and get into fleeing position, I took stock of our inventory and our surroundings. Everything seemed to be in order, and soon enough, we'd be outta here in no time flat.

"Say, that agent you were whispering about. He still in the city?" I whispered

"Yes. I managed to set up a meeting place with her, not him today. She can get us out of here in time." Slalin replied, hoisting her satchel onto her back while I mimicked this action of hers.

"Good. We'll need a backup plan if we need to make it to Korin in time…." I spoke, but that's when it hit me.

Footsteps. And judging from the sound of them or lack of, whoever had been making them was squarely right in front of us. My head now wobbling a tad bit in apprehension, I managed to cock it backward. Slalin, on the other hand, had practically gone brain dead, her body wasn't moving an inch; her breathing looked delayed from the fear.

Standing in front of us, was none other than the Savior of the world himself, Son Goku.

Looking at him, I could manage to utter only one short sentence, before my mouth clamped in on myself due to the wracking of my nerves. Not because of Goku himself, but rather the price we would pay if we stayed here too long. As much as I wanted to ride the DBZ hype train, saving an entire town from a massacre was a bit more important today.

" **Ham Majrare Aaj** ", (We are dying today.)

0o0o0o0o0o

Goku was now very perplexed. Put a bit at unease, even. He had never come off as a scary guy; strangers usually took a nice stand concerning him, at least in his opinion. He had never gotten anybody's ill will or fear unless they were enemies of him from past conflicts. However, what he was seeing in front of him simply wasn't adding up.

What's with the kid? A minute ago he was all happy, and now he's chickened out just from the look of me. Am I that scary from where he comes from? Goku thought to himself.

"Uh… Hey, Kid! You alright?" Goku mentioned, hoping to get a response

" **Ham Marjare Aaj** "

"Huh?" was all that Goku could stammer a little uneasy over this odd, arcane tongue dripping off the boy's mouth. However, at that point, he noticed a young girl standing next to him, attempting to whisper something in his ear. Fortunately for him, her whispering was terrible.

"What about the plan? We need to stall them somehow, or else we won't make it in time!" she hissed

"You think I don't know that? We have a twenty-four ultimatum for your town or it's down the gallows it goes!" the boy agitatedly whispered back, his fingers clenched up

"Uhh… guys, I'm still here!", Goku called, trying to get their attention once more. What are they so worried about. What's up with this town? Goku thought inwardly.

The boy and the girl both shifted their faces back toward him, shaking all the while

"So I've come to the conclusion. **Ham marjare aaj, ham marjare aaj** , or in layman's terms, we're going to die.

"Well, you clearly aren't an optimist… By the goddess, can this day get any worse?!" the girl grumbled

"NO, WHAT GAVE IT AWAY? WAS IT THE COUNTLESS AMOUNT OF BLACK HUMOR I'VE BEEN USING FOR THE PAST TWO MINUTES?!" the boy screamed, sarcasm dripping fresh like venom

"HEY DONT' YOU SASS ME! ILL WHACK YOU WITH THIS POLE IF I NEED TO!" the girl fumed

"WELL EXUUUSE ME, PRINCESS! I'LL SHACK THAT SMUG FACE WITH THIS PAN OF MINE TO NEXT YEAR IF I NEED TO!", the boy shot back, face getting feeder by the minute, as he hoisted said pan up.

By this point, Goku had literally given up on trying to get their attention, as they had descended into a verbal squabble, waiting till they called down, which took a few minutes.

"Holy Nadiria, we need to…." the girl called, eyes widening as she realized her folly, as she turned her eyes toward Goku.

"Crapbaskets!" the boy called, as he ran toward what seemed like a copycat version of the nimbus, one that looked oddly familiar to Goku, the girl following in suit. The girl managed to get on though the poor boy managed to trip on his tunic.

"Darn it all, I should have got a shorter size of this thing…" the boy said, snarling all the while.

With this Goku managed to get a heads up on the boy. His guard had been low, but no longer. He was going to get answers. With that in mind, he walked up to him

"Are you the one that was talking about us?" he queried, a worried face all the while

"Yes. I'll tell you everything, just let her go." the boy replied glumly, motioning toward the girl

"Zain, you can't…!" she cried, looking to be on the verge of tears

However, Goku was so happy with getting the boy to answer his questions, grinning widely, that he hadn't realized his folly. The trap had been sprung.

0o0o0o0o0o

Slalin was feeling to put it bluntly… horrible.

Actually, devastated might be a better way to put it.

He's going to sacrifice his own hide to get me out of here! W...Why does this keep happening to me!? Why can't I keep anybody safe?! Am I that weak? she thought, her mind closing in on her. She had grown to really appreciate Zain as a friend, and now he was just going to throw his life for her while she could do nothing but sit. It was in a sense, the worst form of torture. In less than a day, she would die, and her only friend here, or something close to that matter would be locked up goddess knows where for being, as she put it into Zain's own words, "A Ki-less freak".

However, in that moment of sorrow, Zain winked. And she took notice.

There were few times where Zain winked, but they all pointed to one thing. Fibbing. Whenever he winked, he often was making a joke or lying about something, although he wasn't much of a lying person to begin with. True, it wasn't like he was an angel or anything, he could very well lie, but he only did when he got nervous or in trouble. One time, he had managed to fool her into thinking that you had to eat Indian food with a fork and a spoon. His wink at the nimbus, coupled with snickers and stares at the restaurant, caused quite a bit of pain for Zain that day, involving a huge amount of iron pole chasing along with the shrieking of obscenities. Lucky for him, though, the Nimbus managed to high-tail him out of there before that occurred.

"Alright then, what's your name kid?" Goku motioned, as Slalin cracked her neck towards the scene. Meanwhile, she saw the rest of what Zain had called "The Z-fighters walk forward.

At this Zain curled his lips into a sly smirk, or at least, what looked like one to Slalin. "Muffin Button."

"Wait Wha…." Goku managed to stammer that much out, and only that much, as a needle was pulled to only inches away from his face.

At first, Slalin looked dumbstruck. What is Zain doing? Has he gone mad? she thought to herself. According to from Zain's descriptions, these people were practically gods. What was a needle going to do?

Apparently a lot, as she noticed Goku's face begin to crawl into an expression she knew very well, fear. He then began to shriek loudly and began flailing about; all while his friends began to simply stare at him with unabashed stupidity. You know, I never took you to be the trickster, but you can pull a fast one from time to time, can't you? Slalin thought to herself.

"NEEDLE!" Goku shrieked, as he let go of Zain and scurried away. Meanwhile, the Z-fighters fell on their backs, legs upwards with a sigh, of course, as Zain ran away. As he hopped on the Nimbus, Slalin was undeniably relieved.

"ZAIN! I SWEAR IF YOU EVER DO THAT AGAIN I WILL PERSONALLY WHACK YOU TO DEATH!" she roared, but even that couldn't cover her happiness

"Don't sweat it. Now, nimbus off to Korin!" Zain called, beaming all the while, as the nimbus began to gain altitude.

Meanwhile, the Z-fighters were busy standing around for some reason. "Uhh… Zain why are they just letting us leave?" Slalin mentioned, finger pointing at the gawking crowd of fighters.

"Give em' a minute. They do this a lot. We'll get a head start by not following the monologue-pause card.", Zain called.

With that, the Nimbus managed to rise into the winds and set sail. But, these two escapes arrogantly forgot one thing. If one wants to stab a king, it must stab to kill. An injured one will surely seek you out.

 **Well, see you till next time! Sorry for hanging you guys on another cliffhanger, I just love writing these for some reason! See ya sometime in mid-December! I'll try to get the next chapter done by then since I'm going to India for the christmas weekend, and barely managed to get this done before the conneticut trip I'm going on for a family reunion. Oh well, fate will tell!**


	6. Chapter 6: Gotta Go Fast

**Well, it's been a while. Two weeks, in fact, and just in time! Barely managed to crank this one out, but I had some fun with it, although it was originally going to be much longer. Keep in mind that the next chapter probably won't be coming out till mid-January, I'll be out of country for most of the December break, and I get back home early January. Also, thanks for the people who reviewed, although if there's anybody out there with constructive criticism, please don't hesitate to type it into your review. Well, here we go! Also, for anybody scratching their heads at why I'm questioning if I should or should not use the powers I have, you have to understand that this fic is going to be as realistic as possible. I've always found it odd how all self-insert characters never had moments in their new universes that conflicted with their ideals from "back home", and that's exactly what I'm trying to show here, a more realistic approach. Things like these are going to be a continuing theme of the story, how to analyze what you don't know with what you do know. Anyways, enough talk, let's get reading!**

 **Words and phrases to know:**

 **Izrael (A)- The muslim angel of death, it's said he circles the house of every living person twice in a day. The (A) is for respects.**

 **Ganesha Chaturthi- A festival celebrated in honor of Ganesha, its a big thing in many Indian cities, and in the Indian-Hindu diaspora.**

 **Kurtis- A female version of the kurta, a male garment worn in India for festive and casual occasions, these can also be used as nightgowns**

 **Roadkill and Knots line- It is generally held that to appease a jinn (a sin for most muslims outright), you usually have to give it a sacrifice first, typically a dead animal. As for the ropes, in pre-islamic Arabia, it was conventional to tie knots on ropes and use them to curse somebody.**

 **"Drop and give him Forty"- A reference to a punishment written in the Quran for believing in the words of a fortuneteller, which can be summed up as having a invalidation of your prayers for forty days (you still have to do them anyway).**

 **Ulema- The Islamic word for religious scholars, who deal with rulings on all sorts of questions**

 **"My god how the money rolls in"- A song from the 1920's reflecting the excess revelry of money of the times**

 **Kulfi- Indian ice cream, usually shaped in a conical-cylindrical form (popular flavors include pistachio, mango and even milk skin that forms when you boil milk for too long (malai)**

 **ood- Urdu word for incense (note: this may be a Hydrebadi way of saying it, I don't know. This is how me and my family says it. Correct me if this is slang.**

 **Chimera Wing- An item in dragon quest, and can be used for instant travel between towns (its like a item version of zoom, or for dbz fans, a mini version of instant transmission)**

 **Also, learn your spell term prefixes and names! (I DO NOT want people quibbling about what "such and such word means"**

 **Spell prefixes in terms of power**

 **Basic spells- Have no prefix or suffix (bang, crack, frizz, sizz, woosh)**

 **Intermediate spells- Have a suffix, or a change in letters, (swoosh, crackle, sizzle, frizzle, boom)**

 **Advance Spells- Have a prefix (usually a "ka") and a suffix , and changes in letters (kaswoosh, kafrizzle, karcrack, kacrackle, kaboom)**

 **Types of spells**

 **Offensive spells**

 **Frizz line- Fire spells (single-cast only, include frizz, frizzle, and kafrizzle)**

 **Sizz line- Fire spells (group-cast only, include sizz, sizzle and kasizzle)**

 **Bang line- Explosion spells (all enemies, include bang, boom and kaboom)**

 **Crack line- Ice spells (single, all enemies, and even group-cast, includes crack, crackle, kacrack and kacrackle)**

 **Woosh line- Wind spells (all group-cast, includes woosh, swoosh, and kaswoosh)**

 **Zap line- Lightining spells (single and group-cast, include zap and kazap)**

 **Whack line- Instant death spells (single and group-cast, includes whack, thwack and kathwack)**

 **Recovery spells**

 **Heal line- Regenerate HP, kind of like healing Ki (single to group-cast, include heal (30 hp, 1 person), midheal (75 hp, 1 person), fullheal (all hp to one person), mutliheal (roughly 75 hp to all people in battle), and omniheal (all hp to all people in battle)**

 **Support Spells**

 **Buff line- Increases defense (single and group cast, includes buff and kabuff)**

 **Insulate- Increases defense from breath attacks (fire and ice usually, along with "hot gas"), just insulate here**

 **Sap line- Decreases defense of the enemy (group and single cast, sap and kasap. Note that kasap is half as potent as sap, but effects a group)**

 **Fizzle- Inflicts silence on the enemy, effects a group of enemies (inability to cast spells, for the z-fighters, this means not being able to use ki)**

 **Snooze line- Inflicts sleep on the enemy, (can be group and single cast, includes snooze and kasnooze. Note that snooze is the group cast one)**

 **Fuddle- Spell that causes enemies to turn on each other and attack one another (group-cast)**

 **Dazzle- Spell that causes enemies to hallucinate and miss attacks (group-cast)**

 **Zoom- Spell that can be used to travel from town to town**

 **Evac- Spell that can be used to escape dungeons**

 **Holy Protection- Spell that can be used to ward off monsters**

 **Kaclang- Spell that turns party into steel statues (makes you invulnerable, con is that you can't do a thing for a turn)**

 **Bounce- Reflects magic back onto the caster (single cast)**

 **Snub- Nullifies all incoming magic, friend and foe (single-cast)**

 **Disruptive Wave- Actually a skill, but it's been used so much by monsters as a magic canceller, it's basically magic. Strips away all magic buffs or support spells cast on the party. Can be VERY LETHAL. In the case of the z-fighters, this means a nullification of the super saiyan state. Fortunatley, to ensure that my oc's aren't op so quickly, this is a spell that won't be learnt for a very LONG time)**

 **I may have missed some, so I'll update the list from time to time. Remember, if there's a spell you don't get, check chapter 6!**

 **Now, off to the chapter!**

"Goku, pull yourself together!" Chi Chi screamed, angry stare directed to her current mess of a husband.

Finally managing to shake off his fear, Goku stood up; teeth still slightly flattering like a broken machine from the aftershock.

"Jeez, what was that kid!?" Krillin exclaimed, eyes nearly popping out of his head. He had expected him to be knowledgeable, but this… this was just scary. It was with that, Goku's freak-out that he realized that this kid wasn't joking; he knew everything about them, down to the letter.

"Kakarot, you idiot they're getting away! What the hell are you doing?" Vegeta replied, now with a hint of interest. He had been slightly impressed by the brat's ability to use Goku's fear to his advantage. Most humans would have just chickened out and run away to no avail, like the weaklings they were, but not this one, this one actually possessed a head. Sure he ran away, but, at least, he planned it out. It reminded him of when he or Bulma would try to blackmail or sabotage the other.

At this, Goku was fiddling his fingers on his forehead, trying to perform an instant transmission, when all he could do was stand still.

"Uh, guys…. I can't find them." Goku stated, short and sweet.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY THAT?!" the cry shot out, impatience growing by the minute, from all standing about.

"As in….. they don't have Ki," Goku stated with a bit of a pause

Taking some time to think about this, the z-fighters realized just what was going on. WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY DON'T HAVE KI!?" they all shouted aloud, exasperated at the response

"I'm serious; you guys try if you want to because I didn't pick up on anything!" Goku countered

With this, those able to sense Ki in the vicinity tried to do so but were as easily flabbergasted as Goku was. There was not a signal coming from him, none at all. It was as if the boy and that girl following him were some of the living dead.

"T...this is impossible…" Yamcha stated, with surprise, echoing the same disbelief that was now filling up the area where they stood.

"It's like he's not alive at all. What is that kid? Who or what is he?" Tien questioned to nobody in particular, Chiatzou cocking his head in confusion

"I've heard of Ki-suppression, but this is just maddening, to be born with no Ki at all?" Roshi queried, puzzled beyond words

"Perhaps he's an escapee from Other World.", Krillin pushed out, trying to make sense of it all

"I highly doubt it. I just took a trip to the Other World less than a week ago. King Yemma had just increased security measured to the highest seen in almost five hundred years due to all the commotion in Hell. Plus, he's very much alive. There was no halo atop his head, or have you all forgotten that crucial difference? Also, if he was a dead person here come back from the grave; he would have had sensible life energy." Baba butted in.

"If that's true, what are we waiting for? The more we stand around here, the more time he has to get away!" Bulma shouted, grabbing everyone's attention away from contemplation

"Finally, you make yourself useful, woman. But it's too late now. With that flying abomination, the brat has probably managed to go halfway across the world by now!" Vegeta snarled

Bulma fumed at this but chose to ignore the comment. Getting mad was not going to help right now. They needed a plan and fast.

"Actually, they should still be here. Did any of you hear that girl talking? She was talking about meeting someone here." Goku asked, attempting to get some thoughts running

"Like that's any useful Kakarot. This blasted city has more buildings than humans, it'll be impossible to find him!" Vegeta retorted back, frustrated at the general stupidity surrounding him.

"Maybe not."

At this, all swerved their heads to lay eyes on Piccolo, who had been surprisingly quiet through the whole fiasco.

"The kid spoke two languages when he looked at you Goku. There's only one place in the city that speaks a language close enough to it, he'll probably be hiding there. It's in the western part of the city." Piccolo stated candidly. After fusing with Kami, Piccolo had gone from zero to sixty when it came to Earth and its people, linguistics included, so it would make sense for him to know such.

At this, Bulma tried to jog her head, and suddenly a light bulb went off, "Wait, Piccolo's right! I know just where to look for this kid! Goku, can you say what that kid said again?" Bulma requested

"Muffin Button?" Goku stated, a bit confused

Sighing Bulma asked once more, "Before that!"

"Down the gallows…? Goku hesitantly spoke once more, now even more befuddled as to what was going on.

"Ugh…. I mean the part that sounded weird to you Goku!" Bulma spat out, patience running a bit thin.

"Oh, that… hmm… **Ham Marjare aaj** ", he stated, though in a bit of a weird, anglicized accent, tripping over some of the vowels.

"Yes, that! I've heard a colleague of mine say that rarely from time to time whenever he gets in trouble with someone! The kid's probably in Little Delhi! There's a specific for you guys!" Bulma exclaimed.

"All right then, it's settled. Let's split up and find out where that kid is in that neighborhood! That way, we can cover more ground." Krillin stated, waiting impatiently. You couldn't blame him, though; this was the most exciting thing to happen to him in months. Sure, buu did make them all realize peace and quiet were great, but it was just getting a bit too boring. Relaxing on Kame House had its limits.

With this, the z-fighters split up into a myriad of groups to track down the kid. Goku and Vegeta along with Goten and Trunks were off in the first group while Chi-Chi, Bulma, and 18, holding Marron made up another. Krillin and Yamcha, along with Puar made up a trio, and Launch went off with Tien and Chiatzou. Oolong and Roshi, along with Baba, made up the final group. Piccolo went solo as usual. And with this, what could very well be called the most ridiculous hunting expedition of the ages commenced.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Anybody there?" I asked, dreadfully waiting for a response, as Slalin and I sat atop the Nimbus, the atmosphere poisoned with suspense.

"Negative.", Slalin replied, eyes scouring the sky like a child looking for a lost belonging of theirs, tense and shaken.

" **Ya Allah! Ye din quesa or bura howsakta?!** " (Oh god, how can this day get any worse?!), I moaned to nobody in particular, staring out at the city. Tall and majestic, it looked as grand as it did when I dropped down to here. The sun was shining, the clouds were speeding away and the wind was whistling…

Wait.

There was no wind going on a second ago…..

"UHHH ZAIN, WE'VE GOT COMPANY!" Slalin shrieked, eyes bulging out of her head, pointing at the figures of the z-fighters, slowly closing in on us.

"HOLY HELL, NIMBUS INCREASE THE STEAM, THEY'RE GAINING ON US!", I shrieked, as the Nimbus went as fast as it could, enough to make our face feel like it was going to rip right off our bones. Jeez, where's a sonic when you need one?!, I thought to myself, thought these thoughts were abruptly cut off when we noticed a black thick swarm in the airspace ahead. And judging from the looks of it, it was….heading for us?!

"ZAIN, DRACKEES 12 O' CLOCK!" Slalin screamed once more, now in a fit of hysterics

"HOW THE HELL ARE THOSE THINGS ACTIVE RIGHT NOW?! AREN'T THEY BATS!?" I screamed, losing all composure, acting like as if I was going through convulsions.

"BY THE GODDESS, DO YOU THINK I KNOW?! BUT THEY'RE STILL COMING CLOSER!?" she shrieked back just as loud

"OH GOD, GET READY! WEAPONS AT THE ARM! MAKE SURE NOT TO FALL OFF!" I stated, frying pan held tightly, as Slalin clutched her staff just as much, as we tried to stay stable on the nimbus, as we stood up.

With that, we fell into the eye of the storm, as drakees swept in from every direction. Swinging left and right, we tried to fight off as many that were foolish enough to try to take a dive on us. But there were just too many, and we were beginning to run out of stamina. At this rate, the drakees were going to fetch Izrael (A) for us!

Downing her twenty-fifth drakee, Slalin shrieked, "THEY JUST KEEP COMING! WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO?!"

However, while I was busy swinging, I felt something rather…. off. Not about the environment, mind you, but myself. As cheesy as this sounds, I suddenly felt…. way too calm for a reason. But that calm feeling felt like it hid something, something that could be very useful. I wanted to find out so badly what was behind this new found facade of mine, to show these pesky bats who was boss, but it just wasn't coming. It was on the tip of my tongue, I could almost have it!

"ZAIN, WATCH OUT!" Slalin shrieked, as a party of six drakees dived in, fangs glaring for my neck.

"Crack!"

At this, a huge icicle fell from the heavens and crashed into a majority of the swarm, allowing us to spot an opening, and swiftly make our escape. The drakee swarm fell behind us, and to the plight of the z-fighters, fell in front of them.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"ARE THOSE BATS?!" was all that Krillin managed to speak, eyes bulging at the inconsistency of it all

"Yep. Just look at 'em. They're literally looking at us like we're dinner." Yamcha stated hands crossed across his chest.

Meanwhile, the rest of the z-fighters managed to come into the general vicinity, having only started flying a little while ago.

"That's odd. What would bats be doing at this hour?" Tien stated, not flabbergasted like Krillin, but a bit curious himself

"Tien… Those things don't have Ki either. Be careful!" Chiatzou stated, worried

However, Tien wasn't impressed. These bats were a simple swarm, and they would only be able to follow a person at a time. Swooping closer, he attempted to try to make the bats follow him to let his friends pass, then take care of them through a simple Ki blast.

Unfortunately, the drakees saw through the ploy and managed to separate into four groups to block each of the fighters off. Tien was a bit taken back at this. _Since when were bats this smart?_ he thought to himself.

"I'll guess we'll just have to do this the old-fashioned way.", Krillin sighed his hopes for not being delayed to find the kid dashed, as he saw a small cloud fly away from where the swarm once was.

"Ah well, at least, we'll be able to get a good warm up in!" Yamcha stated, preparing a Ki blast to fire.

At this, the four jumped into the fray, as bats swarmed about, clotting the sunlight away.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Phew, I can't believe I'm saying this, but thank goodness for that swarm! We would have been caught if that hadn't happened!" I laughed nervously, happy that it was all over for now

However, Slalin was not so ecstatic, rather her mouth was as wide as a cavern entrance, only to state, "SINCE WHEN WERE YOU ABLE TO USE MAGIC?!"

"Huh, Magic? Last time I checked, I haven't been dragging roadkill to a summoner, and I haven't been dealing in knots. I don't want to drop and give him forty! So what in the world are you playing at? I stated, a bit confused.

"NOT THAT YOU DOLT! I'm talking about elemental magic! You managed to cast a crack spell!" Slalin stated, ecstatic

Slowly replaying the events that had just occurred, I stated to myself, with some hesitation, "W...Wait, I did?!" It had never occurred to me that I had such potential or any potential at all. However, the question was, could I use it? Just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should do it, after all. Running through some of the rules on magic practice, which is prohibited in its entirety I realized nothing was really stopping me from doing so. The Crack spell wasn't fortunetelling, I was using my own energy to make the ice, a far cry from a jinn doing any work, there wasn't rope involved, and I wasn't drawing pentagrams, using charms, speaking in tongues, or any of that stuff. The ulema never debated dropping an icicle on somebody's head, so I was pretty sure that I was in the clear. Sighing in relief, I mused with a smile, _So I can use it and get stronger!_ pleased that this newfound power would still remain accessible for me. However, reanalyzing the rules, I realized that the whack line and the Puff! spell was probably prohibited. One veered too close to being black magic, what with being "a cursed incantation", and the other mimicked the jinn's ability to shapeshift. Realizing this, I made a quick mental note to myself.

"Zain, you have got a slew of powers coming your way! Meanwhile, I'll be lucky if I get the frizz spell line…" Slalin grumbled, half ecstatic for me, the other half jealous

"Frizz? I thought only king slimes could learn that, and only kafrizzle?" I questioned, cocking my head sideways

"Yeah, the thing is, my father was a king slime, and my mom was just a slime. Monster genetics are kinda weird, but the gist is this. An offspring can pick up qualities from both, whether that is in stat distribution or magic abilities. Since my mom and my dad, were, well, different, I have the potential to learn a whole slew of spells. I've already started training to learn some spells, primarily the support ones. I just got kabuff down a few days ago. My tutors said that I'll be able to cast the frizz line soon, but goddess knows when that's gonna happen." Slalin explained, finishing off with another groan

"Oh, so that's where you were that day…." I motioned, realizing why she had gone missing for a few hours. She had just come back from a park of some sort and was looking unreasonably ecstatic for some reason. I had shrugged off her happiness to the day, but know we know don't we?

"Wait, if you knew kabuff… WHY DIDN'T YA USE IT?!" I screamed, realization dawning on me as frustration boiled upward with it.

"HEY I WAS BUSY FIGHTING FOR MY LIFE; IT KIND OF SLURPED MY MIND!" Slalin shot back for her own defense.

"OH SUUURE! OF COURSE, YOU CONVENIENTLY JUST FORGOT THE ONE SPELL THAT COULD'VE SAVED OUR HIDES! FACE IT; YOU WANTED TO DRAG THE FIGHT OUT!" I retorted back, our faces now both turning red from all the screaming. Had we been any lower, I'm pretty sure we would've stopped traffic due to our little spectacle.

"EXCUSE ME?! AND SINCE WHEN DID I SUDDENLY BECOME VEGETA!? THAT DOES IT, AS SOON AS WE GET OUT OF HERE, WE'RE FIGHTING TO SEE JUST WHO'S RIGHT!" Slalin fired back. Our squabble would have continued for longer, but at this point, we managed to actually find the Indian Quarter once more. With a whoop and a laugh emanating from the two of us over evading the z-fighters, Nimbus scurried down to meet the streets, as our plan began to unfold.

"Well, then, let's see how the z-fighters handle this.…." I thought as we touched down into the neighborhood.

However, as we touched down I noticed a gargantuan amount of Hindus congregating outside. The mandhirs were open in full swing, ood was being burnt, its smoke swirling to the heavens, and the folk there were chatting or praying loud enough to befuddle my thoughts.

"Hey, Zain what's going on here?" Slalin asked, her innocent curiosity showing on her face.

It didn't make much sense, as I stacked my mind on Hindu festivals. I didn't see candles for Diwali, it wasn't spring, so no Holi, and I didn't see any other statues to tell whose day it was.

That is until a huge statue rolled into the street. Humongous it was, being lifted by a truck, consisting of a man with a palm lifted upward and facing forward, a bottom of flowers, and the face to an elephant. At this, a solemn smile passed over my face, as I reminisced over my first trip to India when I was just a kid. A similar festival had occurred at the time, and I never truly forgot its scale.

"Zain you alright? You're awfully quiet." Slalin spoke, shocking me out of memory lane.

"It's nothing. But anyways Slalin, welcome." I stated with a slight smile on my face.

"To what exactly?" she inquired, head cocked in confusion, as she attempted to reason.

"To Ganesha Chaturthi of course! I might not celebrate it, and I probably never will, but there'll be sales all over the neighborhood, that's what I'm here for! Can you imagine, we'll be able to get lunch for almost half the price! We might even be able to get some good kulfi for cheap for once! Now, who's hungry?!" I yelled happily, as I sped off onto a shopping joyride, nimbus whistling, as Slalin got dragged from behind, as I sang a little tune.

"Well…. I'm pretty sure Megoosa is going to have a chimera wing anyway, we can kill some time here…" Slalin grumbled to herself, trying to reason

"My sister she works at the laundry, my father sells bootlegger gin…" I continued singing, completely oblivious to Slalin by this point

Slalin looked at me puzzled, tiring to figure out what in the world I was babbling about, but she let me be, in order to have my moment. She then proceeded to begin to eye some of the clothing stores. She had become a sucker for kurtis for nightwear to sleep in, and she had an excited glint in her eyes. Chased or not, deadlines or not, a little shopping never hurt.

"My mother she takes in the washing, my god how the money rolls in!" I sang out, and with that, we set out, for a buying frenzy unprecedented in all our time here. However, at the back of heads, we realized that our captors were not far. Fun would have to be juggled with business, that age-old quarrel. Unfortunately, things don't always work out that way, am I right? We can plot and ploy, but fate always seems to get the upper hand. But regardless, off we went, trying to put the distress of our chase behind us. It was time for some well-deserved relaxation, consequences be damned. Z-fighters or no, nobody was going to get in between me and my shopping spree, and I was to make sure of that, one way or another.

 **Another cliffhanger, another chapter. I'm just too evil for my own good. The real madness begins from here on out. As for Megoosa... well you'll be seeing her in a little while. See you guys in January and happy holidays! If you don't celebrate the holidays, then happy shopping! Also, since me and Slalin have been battling enemies, it would be helpful if I put down levels, starting from now. Since the characters will be learning more spells than possible compared to the games, spells will be learnt much quicker. For example, slalin learns kabuff by lvl.5 here, while slimes normally don't get the spell until lvl.14. There'll be a discussion on this later on the story, but that's for me to know and write down and you to figure out!**

Me- lvl.6

Slalin- lvl.5


	7. Chapter 7: Marathoning Ganesha Chaturthi

**Authors note:**

 **Sorry for being late, by like a month. This chapter just seemed to drag itself on and on and on. Hopefully, it's to everybody's liking. Not much here to actually define. Also, all series written about here are not mine, nor are their characters. If they were, these series would be garbage due to my horrible design skills.**

 **Armamentalist- Mystic Knights of the Dragon Quest Series, mixing up magic and muscle**

 **Larki: A woman**

 **Now, off with the chapter!**

Yamcha stared, looking upward, as he and his friends began to walk into the neighborhood. He had expected a lot of people… but this was just insane. The streets were chock full, and the buildings looked fit to burst. Not to mention, a lot of people were wearing the same clothes as the kid. To say that this was to be finding a needle in a haystack would be the biggest understatement of the year.

"So, is everyone else here?", Tien spoke, breaking the silence that had enveloped the four, as he cast a glance left and right for possible sightings.

"Give it a couple of minutes, the train is usually slow around now." Krillin stated as they waited at the terminal.

It had been a rather hectic few minutes that had gone by. The bats had quite nearly bit onto Krillin's jugular, and had he not noticed, he would've been a blood meal. They managed to blast them, but the real challenge was only beginning. Staying here, he counted the minutes by.

A little while later after this, the train doors opened, and out popped everyone else. Bulma, Launch, Baba, Rushing, Oolong, anybody who couldn't fly, ran right out, crashing a bit into the now dispersing mass of folk going about their daily lives, their intersections on the train cut short.

"Damn it and my hairs ruined too!" Bulma grumbled, and she ran her hair to fix some knots.

"Come on Bulma, we don't have forever here! You want to lose that kid?!" Puar cried

"Heheh, I wouldn't mind getting lost myself!" Roshi stated as he went in for the usual kill, though not before a wok to the head bonked him into submission

"Enough of that! Who's going where?" Chi-Chi stated, always a voice of reason if she wanted to be, and a martinet too.

Taking a glance, Bulma pondered for a while, "Alright, my group will take the western part, oolong, you guys get the middle. Everybody else goes west.", Bulma stated, though not before adding a word of caution that they should reconvene at the terminal in case the kid made use of the train as a getaway.

"Alright, let's wait here for a second. Goku and the others aren't here yet. But where are we to look, I don't have a clue!", Launch spoke, as she titled herself left and right, just as befuddled as the rest.

At that, Goku and the rest arrived, walking from own, careful not to attract any extra attention so as to not alert their presence.

"So, did you see them, guys?" Goku asked, only to get a collective no.

Vegeta simply harrumphed in agitation at this, "Why would they, it isn't like the brat and his friends were going to run into their arms. If anything, that was your job to deal with, Kakarot."

Goku raised his hands up to counter, "Hey it wasn't my fault, okay? In case you forgot, the kid did pull a needle at me! He knows every fear and weakness we have! Kami, Vegeta, for all we know, he could be finding worms to shove in your face!"

Vegeta paled a little at the thought, but quickly regained his composure so as to not exude weakness, "Did any of you idiots see the brat in the time that it took to get here?" he ordered, harsh as ever

"We did… but…" Krillin stated, not wanting to finish. He really didn't want to get on Vegeta's bad side; he had had enough of that on Namek, the androids…. Everywhere really.

"But what?" Vegeta seethed, growing more impatient, much to Krillin's dismay

"He got away…" Krillin spoke, nervousness trickling out of his mouth, as he saw Vegeta's eyes twitch.

"How is it that this brat, managed to escape your clutches? Last time I checked, you were supposed fighters, not pansies", Vegeta spoke coldly

"Lay of Vegeta, alright? It's the bats that did us in any way." Yamcha spoke, not really angry at him, but a bit annoyed.

"Oh, so the weakling couldn't handle some pathetic earthling wildlife?" Vegeta retorted, trying to egg Yamcha on.

Yamcha began to speak, but just before he did so, Tien shot him a glare. It was a quick glance, but the message was clear. _Not now_. Yamcha immediately settled down, while Bulma looked on in mild disapproval at her husband. A few years ago, when Yamcha was still excessively cocky, she would have welcomed this, but with everything having simmered down, Vegeta simply looked childish when he did this. Yamcha didn't even have feelings for her anymore, so this could get annoying real quick.

"Enough of this. We need to get moving. If we stay here, the kid will be long gone. He isn't going to wait for us. I say we split up our groups a little bit more." Tien stated hands folded across his chest.

"But Tien, wouldn't that make us more vulnerable? I mean, strength is in numbers." Chiatzou questioned, not really getting the logic behind this notion.

By this time, Piccolo had long descended into the area, and was silently overhearing the conversation, and now spoke.

"Seems good. We'll cover more ground. The kid and his friends aren't powerful; they're going to be relying on trickery to evade us. By covering more ground, we can blockade them." Piccolo spoke tactically.

"Alright then. It's settled. Who's going where then?" Bulma stated. She didn't like the idea of splitting further, but she understood the wisdom behind it. Staying in big groups left too much street area untracked for the kids use.

"Krillin, I'd say you could go with 18. Tien, Launch, and Chiatzou can go together. Yamcha and Puar can cover another area. Vegeta could probably go with Trunks, and Goku could take Gotten. Bulma and Chi-Chi could go together, and Baba and whoever's left is the last group, which counts Roshi and Oolong." Piccolo stated.

"Huh, why do I have to go with them, I'll probably die!" Oolong questioned his cowardice showing.

"Last time I checked, you could shape shift Oolong", Bulma stated, trying to bury the hatchet

"But that's for only five minutes! Oh alright fine, just tell me you'll pay my hospital bill! ", Oolong countered

Bulma moaned in exasperation, and to get this all of her head, spoke: "Fine Oolong, just get going!"

"The pig can shape shift? Woman, I've said it before, and I'll say it again, how the hell did you make friends with these idiots?" Vegeta questioned. He never made any effort to ask about Bulma's friends or any of the z-fighters for that matter, he considered most not worth his time.

"Vegeta… if you think that's weird, you've got a long way to go", Bulma deadpanned. For nearly two decades, she and her friends had been the literal definition of weird. Space travel, aliens, demon kings, magic balls, and robotic nightmares were simply not normal, not to mention time travel. A three-eyed man who was once an assassin and a green fellow who had 3 identifies fused, an amnesiac alien, a killer android, and a bipolar gun trigger blond and gentle lilac woman only stacked the list higher. But, as they say, life is strange.

"Alright, hurry up already! I'm not sitting around for nothing here. I'm got customers to consult!" Baba said, sitting on her crystal ball, which floated in an agitated fashion.

"They did say the kid was with a pretty girl", Roshi whispered to Oolong, as they both snickered at the possibilities, though not before getting woked by Chi-Chi.

"I've had enough of you Roshi! Come on, we're moving!" Chi-Chi yelled, drawing attention from some of the festival goers, as she stomped away.

"Hey, Goten, how much money do you bet that your mom will go crazy?" Trunks whispered. They had been standing close to their moms earlier, but now had broken their silence. Even though they had been branded "twins of terror", they still knew when to stay silent.

"Huh? Why should I bet on my mom getting angry, you know she will." Gotten said, the humor clearly flying over his head, Trunks signing at this show of naivety.

"Well, that's settled. Come on, gotten!" Goku called cheerily, to which gotten immediately compiled. At this, and perhaps by coincidence, everyone split up, ready to tackle the problem at hand, in their groups, unaware of the madness that was to take place.

0o0o0o0o

Around the same time, the throwing of clothing was occurring, a heap growing bigger by the minute.

"Oh come on Slalin, JUST PICK ONE ALREADY! YOU'RE NOT A DAMN MODEL, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!" I screamed as Slalin took her time in the fitting room.

"Phew. I think this one fits. That was so much annoying work right there." Slalin called, as she stepped out, wearing a kurti with a floral pattern.

"Alright, can you buy the damn thing? I'm sure Nimbus has evaporated from all of your crap decisions." I fumed. Forgive me, but I hate cloth shopping with a vengeance.

"Well, I'm truly sorry that I actually like to sleep with dignity. I never knew his royal highness desires his lady company bare." Slalin retorted, earning a bit of a disapproving look from the Indian shopkeeper.

I scowled in return, embarrassed at the attention and innuendo she had thrown out, "Whatever! Just hurry up already! Where did you say that friend of yours was!" Personally, I was at the end of my rope right about now. Slalin was taking absolutely forever to pick a dress, the shopkeeper looked like he was at the end of his rope, I had probably lost all self-dignity in that store forever and the Z-fighters were probably running through the entire city to hunt us down. I mean, if that doesn't fit your description of chaotic, I don't know what the hell will.

Sighing as Slalin finished ruffling the wrinkles on the old clothes she had been in the process of wearing minutes before, she spoke once more, from the fitting room "She was supposed to meet us here. Like right now. I wonder where in goddesses name she is..." she said, though not before she helped.

"Slalin is something wrong!" I hollered, a little anxious. Was there an invisible peeping tom in there? Last time I checked, jinns didn't hide in fitting rooms and wait for women like a Roshi. Then again, I'm pretty sure they've managed to peep at enough women anyway, what with living in bathrooms and all.

"Megoosa! GET OUT! HOW IN GODDESSES NAME DID YOU GET IN HERE?!" I heard a shriek, combined with the whipping of fabric on someone's skin.

"Oh…. My apologies your highness. I shall make myself scarce. Is your companion outside?" I heard once more. I recognized the voice; however, it didn't take long. This was the mystery man…. Woman from the Indian restaurant a few days prior.

"YES. NOW GET OUT!" I heard Slalin holler, and by now the whole store had eyes on us. I simply looked to heaven in all of this and moaned inwardly, _Ya Allah, me kui_? ( **Oh god, why me?)**

"Yes, your majesty. I shall take my leave now, then", I heard, as the door opened, though not before she quickly slammed it shut, to prevent prying eyes to see the one inside.

She then proceeded to walk over to me, and then, we stared at each other. And no, not in some infatuation contest! We were simply sizing ourselves up. She was a little shorter than Slalin, but no midget. She wore clothes one would see at eastern port cities, Shanghai and Tokyo came to thought. She had jet sky blue hair, the color being cyan, like a Bermuda lagoon. Her eyes were blue as well, almost frost-like, and she had on her dress, gray outlines, like lace, adorning it. But enough of that, I had questions! What would a princess be doing so far from home! I thought she had been a simple official, and while her story was most likely true, this only made more questions concealed. Just what was I getting muddled in?

I tried to put two and two together, and eventually, a lighbulb lit up, "Say, you're a man o' war, ain't ya?" I stated, trying to ease the situation. Seriously, it was like she was glaring daggers, and poised to dig them into my jugular while she was too!

"Indeed. How did you manage to meet her Majesty? From what I can tell, you two have become quite friendly with each other. You have seemed to have earned her trust. But do you have what it takes to stay for her?" she stated her voice chill like ice.

"Uhhh…. If you think I want to tie the knot… you've got another thing coming! I'm only 16!" I stated, only to put my hand over my mouth, eyes widening. _Curses! Damn that blasted mouth of mine!_ I thought. Now I'd done it, she was probably going to render me paralyzed from the waist down! I gulped at the thought, nearly choking on my own saliva.

But the awaited never sting never hit, instead, I saw Megoosa staring at me, with a slight smirk, "I see now how you managed to deal with her majesty now. You aren't afraid to speak your mind in front of your allies. Consider yourself lucky, most of her tutors struggled with her to learn pleasantries in introductions, and she used to intimidate them regularly to skip her lessons. She is quite headstrong, goddess knows that. You even protected each other when danger had struck. Had you not, she would have been dead by now in a gutter." Megoosa stated, still in a cold voice, but I could tell that her pitch had shifted, into something a bit more amiable.

"Oh… Thank you." I responded, trying to keep up a good face, only for Megoosa to frown.

"Stop that."

"Huh? Stop what?" I stated, not knowing just what she was getting at.

"That demeanor. We are allies now if you recall, there is no need for you to pull a mask over your face to look good right now. I'm a covert soldier, not an ambassador." she stated bluntly.

"Oh… sorry." I stated sheepishly, though not before my mind wandered once more to inquiry lane, "Say what brings you to this area? I've heard of the civil war in Korin, but not much else." I questioned, hoping to get answers. But, considering this was a secret agent I was talking too, I was sure to have my request rebuffed.

"Ah...so you have heard of the situation in our new homeland. The platinum brotherhood is still very much a threat." Megoosa stated.

"Is that the name of the faction you are fighting? Wait, but first, what exactly caused this whole mess? Greed, or are we talking about something a tad more complicated?" I pressed, trying to make rationalizations. _This faction seems to consist of metal slimes, given the name that may have held power in a previous regime before they came here. So there may be a slimish French revolution going on here._ I thought.

Megoosa simply sighed, rubbing her forehead, "Indeed, the fight has not been easy. The enemy was once holding seats of power, having great control in the kingdomly affairs of his majesty's. However, that all came to a close with the purge." she stated, her eyes glazing over. I shuddered a little at this, the atmosphere of the Indian cloth shop lost to me. I was simply too engrossed in my quest for answers which were flowing from Megoosa's mouth like the water from the fountain of youth. And I was beyond parched for such a drink.

"If you don't want to talk about it…" I started only to be silenced by a hands wave.

"It's fine. To start, have you heard of the demon lord?" she questioned, attempting to gauge my knowledge.

"Uhh…. Which one are we talking about?" I stated stupidly, my eyes scrunched up, and my head cocked to the right at an angle.

"His highness, Psaro the Manslayer, Great king of all the world's monsters." Megoosa stated, and with that, it all clicked into place.

"Amon did this to you, didn't he? You must have been on Psaro's side during the brief civil war that emerged in the monster lands." I stated, slowly, carefully.

For just a minute, a look of surprise shot through Megoosa's eyes, which then proceeded to turn back into a stoic look.

"Indeed. When Psaro was murdered, most monsters immediately blamed the humans, not knowing that by that point, the hero and his comrades had prevented his death by resurrecting his love. There was a small group, however, that refused to believe that Psaro had fallen and that Rose had been murdered by someone in their ranks, but most of them had been imprisoned. As for those loyal to Amon, all they had seen was Nadiria's main castle collapsing. Fortunately for us, a slime was present in Lady Roses quarters back in Rosehill and saw the murder happen with his own eyes, as he hid beforehand as per Lady Rose's orders. Amon took advantage of this event, replaced Psaro, took over Diabolic Hall, and systematically began to eliminate all enemies against him. We were the first on his list, as we had contacts with Zamoksova's royal family. We had hoped to alert the tsarnaeva, Lady Alena, and the hero through her. And Amon knew of this possibility." Megoosa stated, without much ado.

"That seems like a good plan… but what happened afterwards?" I asked. Clearly, a wrench had been thrown into their plans, but where and when was the question for said wrench.

"At the time, Alena was still traveling around the world to restore Lady Rose's life along with her friends. The people of Zalengard, Toborov, and Vrenor decided that it would be best to keep the castle empty until the tsarnaeva returned. Unfortunately, Amon took that as an opportunity. His forces ransacked our villages and towns. The spell casters of Amon's army also put a variant of the fizzle and dazzle spells on the surrounding area, rendering it mute and invisible to other towns, so that they were left in the dark as to what was going on there. Not a single soul was spared. The things that I saw that day… were some of the most horrifying memories I will forever carry. The only reason I survived was because my parents hid me in a chest in my home. By the time it had all ended, and I got out, my whole family laid dead at my feet. All I could do was quickly offer a prayer to the dead in the goddesses name and leave. Fortunately, a contingent loyal with our leader, Kingsley picked me up. I was adopted into the royal family, and there I learned the arts of combat and stealth, along with magic. They basically took the place of my old family, in all aspects, emotional as well as physical. However, one day, a mysterious portal opened up. At the time, months after the first attack, Amon's forces had besieged us again, and to prevent another massacre, Kingsley ordered that the civilians take the teleporter, as it was our only chance of escape. Many of our soldiers fell trying to stave back the monsters, but our majesty and everyone else managed to get to the teleporter in time. I have never fought so furiously then compared to that day. I broke nearly eleven boomerangs in that battle. We landed up in Korin, as the natives call it, and there we now slowly rebuild. It's been five years since we used the teleporter, and we truly have no reason to go back. We've managed to keep the existence of our town a secret, surprisingly. I'd expected the children to get too gusty and stumble on some people." she stated, with a light chuckle.

"So, if that's how it all ended, how did this mess start? How did your happy ending get disrupted?" I stated, with an impatient tone. I was determined to get to the bottom of this, but this was simply so much information! Where was the stuff I needed to know?!

"Unfortunately… there existed slimes loyal to Amon. They initially acted behind the scenes trying to blockade the teleportal from being used, and to initiate talks with Amon diplomatically, but Lord Kingsley blocked all such efforts, considering them heinous and dishonorable to Psaro, and Rose's memory. However, after we left Zamoksva, they had enough. They formed their own faction, spearheaded by many, but not all, of the wealthy metal families, and began to amass an army. We have been fighting for almost a year, luckily; however, none of the battles are near humans and use tactics that don't alter the landscape, as both sides are afraid of being discovered. Slalin was actually evacuated from there, she nearly got kidnapped from her home and was only a breadths way from death. She had been supposed to find a safe house to the south, but it seems she took matters into her own hands and headed for the urban areas… leading to you." Megoosa finished, waiting for me to pick up the rest.

"Oh yeah…. I found her and Nimbus getting ganged up on by slimes. I whacked them away with a frying pan a week or two ago. That's how I met her. We've been on the run ourselves, I must say, and we're kind of living illegally. Staying concealed from the earth's greatest fighters isn't a walk in the park, I tell ya!" I stated, with a hint of optimism. For some reason, I've always managed to crack a joke at my own misfortune, just to get a laugh out of myself. God knows why I do it, but who cares why I do it anyway?

"So you saved Her Majesty as well, have you not? It appears that you aren't as weak as you seem. Do you possess any other skills?" Megoosa stated, tapping her foot to an unheard rhythm.

"Well… I did manage to cast a crack spell, like an hour ago. Slalin learned kabuff some time ago…. mrf." I stated, finishing the statement with a bit of huffed, muffled noise of anger.

"Is that so? I see, you seem to have magic abilities. Not many have those, you know. Consider yourself lucky. But, having them is not enough; you must learn to hone these abilities to a fine point, and a weapon to be feared." Megoosa stated as the clock chimed eight.

"Yeah, I should probably do that…Hey speak of the devil, Stalin's done!" I exclaimed as I heard a slight tick, a sure sign that the fitting room door has been opened.

"Man that took forever! I'm pretty sure I would've gone gooey over all that stuff! Anyway, what's the slime?" she stated, happy as can be.

Taking a glance at the clock, I responded, "About ten. Ohh, jumah's happening near noon, what to do till then?" I responded, looking to everyone for answers.

"Why not hunt for some more stuff? I'm sure you've got some clothes to ooze too. Like seriously, that's the only clothes I've seen you in, that thobe and those jeans. Diversity your wardrobe a bit!" Slalin half-chided.

"I guess so. Megoosa, would it be alright if we left a little after noon. The nimbus can take us there within a few hours at max speed." I stated, pointing at the nimbus outside, who was busy roaming in circles. Like me, he hated cloth shopping as well, especially after Slalin tried to put a hat on him. I don't know why she tried that stunt; the thing wouldn't have even looked good on him.

"That is acceptable. Besides, this place intrigues me. I would like to request permission to accompany her Majesty on her expedition of commerce." Megoosa stated dryly. At first glance, you would think that she was being forced to do that, but a quick look into her eyes proved otherwise. She was dying to go get some stuff.

"Permission granted sis. Anyway, it's best we all stay in the same neighborhood. If anyone gets into a gooey situation, use these..." she stated, as she passed some chimera wings about. We had gotten them from some mad moles that had just been running around, and would have probably hurt someone had we not beaten the tar out of them.

"Use the wing to slurp to this shop. Then we'll take nimbus and hightail it outta here. There's no need for running into the z-fighters now." she stated, matter-of-fact.

"Slalin, I don't think that's gonna work. These people are REALLY fast, a chimera wing would be child's play for them to catch. It wouldn't be worth it. What we'll need to do is stick together, and use our wits to defeat them, and split up to confuse if needed. "I stated aloud.

"A good idea if any. We will have to use our own tricks and magic skills to outmaneuver them. Zain, you know these men well do you not? Your analysis of them will be vital to our success." Megoosa stated, analyzing my plan.

"To say that I simply know them would be an understatement, but whatever. Come on, let's get moving! Shop till you drop as they say!" I exclaimed happily. With that, we left the store and began to walk to our next area. Little did we know, however, of the chaotic comedy that was soon to befall us, one we would laugh at for years to come.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"You got anybody?" Chi-Chi asked as she spoke through a walkie-talkie.

"Nope. Coast's clear." Krillin's voice echoed through, with a hint of exhaustion

"Haven't gotten anybody here either, and considering the festival is already getting more crowded, it's only going to get harder." Chi-Chi stated, and with that, she disconnected.

"Bulma. You see anybody?" she called over, as Bulma walked back toward their group from a block away.

"Nope. They might be hiding in the stores, but we can't get them there. It would wind up causing a scene. But you have to admit, these kids are a lot smarter than they let on!" Bulma stated with a grin

"Heh, kinda like you, I guess. I mean, I don't think anybody here would think you're one of the richest people on the planet. Remember that time you wound up making a shrinking device? Master Roshi sure had a ball with that one!" Chi-Chi replied with a grin, reminiscing upon old memories

"Kami, even I don't even want to know what he's managed to do that thing, what with him going after my breasts for nearly a decade now!" Bulma stated, getting a bit lost in the conversation.

"Yeah, Roshi sure can be a pain when it comes to that. But anyways, we've got kids to find! Now… where could they…" Chi-Chi stated before her breath hitched sharply inwards, and her face slightly whitened.

"Chi, what's wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost!" Bulma cried, trying to make sense of it all before she saw.

"It's them… come on Bulma, hurry!" Chi-Chi cried, as she began to run towards their own targets. She was a more than a little angry at them, and for good reason. How dare they try to hurt her husband with that needle trick of theirs! When she was through with them, they'd be seeing stars, she swore it!

0o0o0o0o0o0o

As we managed to run out of the store, I felt a little uneasy. Call it a fluke premonition, but I felt like as if we were being followed. However, I quickly dismissed the thought. Thinking too much about misfortune is sure to make it reach you; one must go about with the right attitude in times like these. With that feeling out of the way, I finally managed to take a good glance at my surroundings. The streets were already covered in tinsel and banners, and images of Ganesha decorated the homes. Stores were up and about, taking advantage of the holiday to make the cashier ring wild. As people went, they flocked to the mandhirs, to their private family shrines, to sneak a prayer in. Others were busy rampaging through stores to get a good Ganesha statue for last minute religious purposes. The restaurants looked fit to burst, what with all of the people coming and going due to the festival. In short, the place looked like a ticking time bomb!

"Zain, can you dump these bags onto Nimbus? We've got to get some clothes for Megoosa like right now, and I am not slurping about with these five-ton bags!" Slalin shrieked aloud.

"Your Majesty, perhaps it would be wise if you carried a couple of bags. You do need the exercise, after all." Megoosa spoke.

"EXCUSE ME, BUT DID YOU JUST CALL ME FAT!" Slalin fumed, looking fit to burst.

"It may mean that if you wish it to mean such." Megoosa stated with a dry tone, though with a smirk. Me and Nimbus couldn't help but chuckle a little at the scene...well more like whistle for the nimbus, but you get the idea.

"FOR YOUR INFORMATION, I'VE BEEN RUNNING AROUND ON A SURVIVAL BASIS, AND AM ALSO TECHNICALLY HOMELESS! I THINK I'M GETTING MY EXERCISE!" Slalin shrieked, before settling into a huff.

"Alright then, now that that's over with, I say we…." I spoke, though not before my breath hitched.

"Zain, what's wrong?" Slalin spoke, snapping out of her fit of anger. At the sight of my face, she immediately recognized the issue, swerving her head to the back of the road.

"By the goddess…."

"Oh no…"

The nimbus looked fit to piss itself while Megoosa slipped into a jogging stance. We also began to tense, our adrenaline levels shooting through the roof, as we began to run away from the two women that were after us.

"HEY KID, STOP RUNNING! WE JUST WANT TO TALK!" Bulma shouted, at the top of her lungs, goodness was she loud.

Chi-Chi, on the other hand, didn't seem so benevolent, swinging around a wok like she meant bloody murder, "HOW DARE YOU TRY TO SCARE MY HUSBAND! YOU COULD HAVE POKED HIS EYES OUT!"

My eyes nearly bulged out of my head when I saw the accursed wok she was carrying, " **YA ALLAH,** NOT THE FRYING PAN OF DOOM!"

Megoosa looked at me with an odd expression, to question, "Zain, that is simply a frying pan. What more can it do?", a little confused at all this hullabaloo over the frying pan

Turning to her with fearful eyes, I spoke, my voice tinged with terror, "Megoosa, that frying pan has managed to injure some of the greatest fighters on this planet, and possibly this universe." At this, Megoosa's eyes widened, and she wisely zipped her mouth.

"BY THE GODDESS, WHY NOW OF ALL TIMES?! I JUST SAW A GOOD SALE ON LONG ROBES! WE CAN'T HANDLE THIS, THEY'RE TOO STRONG, WERE GONNA DIE. DIE I TELL YOU! THAT CRAZY LADY IS GOING TO BEAT US TO DEATH WITH THAT FRYING PAN!" Slalin wailed in frustrated terror.

"SLALIN NOW IS NOT THE TIME! WE ARE KIND BUSY RUNNING AWAY FROM A WORLD MARTIAL ARTIST FINALIST, THE FRYING PAN OF DOOM AND THE RICHEST LADY ON THE PLANET, IF YOU'VE FORGOTTEN. **AP THORASA PAGAL HOGE**?!(HAVE YOU GONE A LITTLE CRAZY?!)

"Slalin, I do suggest we pick up the pace, and for you to rein in your emotions. If not, those women are sure to catch us. By the goddess, are they quick on their feet." Megoosa stated, with a hint of surprise, as we were busy running all the while.

"ALL RIGHT EVERYBODY, GET MOVING. NIMBUS, GO HOLD THESE! OH WHAT TO DO, WHAT TO DO!" I screamed as the Nimbus moved its way towards me. As such, I dumped my shopping bags onto it and began running for dear life. We wound up bumping into many and Indian, got heaps of dirty stares, you name it. We looked like vagabonds. I nearly rammed my head into a giant Ganesha statue someone was carting from a truck, for crying out loud! _If I don't get "captured" by the z-fighters and metaphorically die, I'm sure a Ganesha statue is going to crack my skull and make literally die_ , I fumed, at my own misfortunes.

Unfortunately to top off our bad luck, Slalin's remarks made Chi-Chi get even more enraged, especially at the demon comment. Had she been able to use Ki, the whole block probably would be a wreck right now. Her eyes looked red like blood, well not literally, but you get the idea, and she was shrieking like a banshee. "OH, THAT DOES IT! LOOKS LIKE IVE GOT SOME DISCIPLINING TO DO! I THOUGHT KIDS THESE DAYS KNEW THAT YOU SHOULDN'T DISOBEY YOUR ELDERS! THAT LITTLE VIXEN NEEDS TO BE TAUGHT A LESSON!"

Bulma, on the other hand, was busy trying to calm Chi-Chi down as she was running, "Slow down Chi, I'm pretty sure Goku and the others want these kids alive! We don't need to get arrested for first-degree murder here!", but it was all in vain. If anything, all the chatter was simply fueling Chi-Chi's bloodlust to ever greater heights.

Slalin now looked like she was about to join the pissing train that Nimbus had started, as she jumped into Megoosa's arms, "THIS IS A ROYAL COMMAND, MEGOOSA. I COMMAND YOU TO HOLD ME AND RUN THE HELL AWAY FROM HERE! OH AND FIND A TOILET FOR ME!" she shrieked, her voice having lost all reason.

Megoosa complied, but immediately frowned in distaste, "Slalin, I thought I raised you better than this."

"EXCUSE ME, BUT LAST TIME I CHECKED, GETTING CHASED BY A SADISTIC, BLOOD LUSTY FELLOW IF REASON ENOUGH TO BE SCARED! DON'T GET COCKY ON ME NOW, SIS! DONT EVEN TRY!" Slalin angrily argued.

But in the midst of all that, a sneaky little plan began to form in that shameful excuse of what I can call my brain, a new hypothesis if you will. The magic here most likely followed the laws of Ki that were already present here. Magic in Dragon Quest was very static, it only could do one thing, and one couldn't mix up spells. Ki, on the other hand, was like water, a kind of universal solvent, if you will. It could go with most other attacks involving Ki, being able to be mixed up with physical attacks, in a semi-armamentalist like fashion, and could be used for many purposes, along with being able to fuse with other Ki attacks. Therefore, magic most likely followed the same logic. As I cocked my head backward to look at the still jogging Chi-Chi and Bulma, who may I add, were very persistent in getting us, we had nearly run four blocks distance, I realized that I could possibly, encase the ground in ice and get them to slip onto their rumps. The fall would only buy us a few seconds of time, but those seconds could possibly allow us to slip into the crowd. It was a risky plan, but it wasn't like we had anything else left to throw into the game here.

"Okay guys, we're gonna need to stop for a couple minutes", I stated aloud, only to get a faceful of disbelieving stares.

"ARE YOU INSANE?! DO YOU WANT THOSE CRAZY LADIES TO GET A HOLD ON US?" Slalin shrieked, as she looked back, only to know find an angry Chi Chi…. and a visibly fuming Bulma.

"OH SO I'M CRAZY TOO, HUH? WELL, YOU BETTER SAY YOUR PRAYERS THEN, BECAUSE YOU'LL BE SEEING STARS AFTER I'M DONE WITH YOU! NOBODY CALLS THE SMARTEST LADY ON THE PLANET CRAZY AND GETS AWAY WITH IT!", she stated threateningly, having gotten what looked like a giant fly smasher, only made of metal, you know the thing she used to whack Roshi with in one of the OVA's.

"GOOD JOB MARRON, NOW THEY BOTH WANT US DEAD. DOES HER ROYAL HIGHNESS HAVE ANY MORE STATEMENTS TO RAISE HER STUPIDITY STAT. OH WAIT, YOU'VE ALREADY MAXED THAT OUT! PLUS, YOU'VE RUINED ANY CHANCE OF THE PLAN I HAD TO SUCCEED!" I shrieked aloud, as we swerved, and barely missed, a group of Ganesha statues. By now, I was pretty sure we were going to make the six o' clock news just for sensationalism. I had already seen a couple of people take their phones out, to record our little run from terror.

"I must concur with Zain, Slalin. Your statements have cost us a lot in survival probabilities." Megoosa uttered, with a hint of disappointment.

Behind us, however, we heard a sickening crunch of something, only to see that Chi-Chi had run a little too close to the carting Ganesha statues. Bulma had managed to stop before the collision, but had managed to sprain herself a little, but Chi-Chi hadn't been so lucky. She had literally rammed her head into the darn thing and looked like she had fainted. I was expecting some more damage, but hey, she had been a martial artist and managed to handle a blow from a Super Saiyan Goten in the Buu saga. The people that had been carrying the statues looked bewildered as to where this larki come from, and why she looked so aggravated, even unconscious.

We didn't stop running, however, and after all of this, making sure that we could find a hiding place to stave off the ambushes the z-fighters could cook up, be it an alleyway, a shop, a mundane place to eat, anything would have worked! As for me, I was busy praying, no begging that in his infinite wisdom, Allah hadn't written for us a car that involved a crash collision with the z-fighters in any fashion! However, we suddenly realized that if we were in open areas, they would surely be able to get an aerial visual on us. Realizing this, we swerved into an alley, and hid under a tin roof thing, hoping to stay away from most of the terrors that could befall us.

However, someone was being rather pushy in that little area that we were in, continuously bumping into us back and forth.

"Slalin, stop doing that! You're hurting my back!", I said in a slightly hushed tone, so as to not attract attention, but jeez, this really hurt! It was like I was being pricked by stones!

"Zain, that's all you! Stop bumping into me!", Slalin hissed, also seeming as if she was in pain as well. Realizing it was neither one of us, we turned our heads to the next likely culprit

"Well then, it has to be Megoosa! Come on, stop bumping into us!" we both exclaimed, only to realize that she was sitting a distance away from us as well. That's when it clicked

"Wait, if it wasn't you…." I stated, quite apprehensively

"And it wasn't me…." Slalin stated sheepishly, as we both looked behind, to have our eyes widen in horror.

Sitting behind us, was a quartet of hammerhoods. They're short stubby things, orange in skin color, clothed in a purple hood, and they wield enormous wooden hammers. And judging from their faces, they were VERY agitated by us. Realizing that those things could smash our heads in with those hammered of theirs if they managed to connect with us, I slowly began to back off, as did Slalin. But it was too late, for by then, one of the hammerhoods had managed to attempt a ramming attack against Megoosa. She jumped back to avoid it just in time and cursed us with glaring gazes that would make anyone else piss themselves.

"You idiots…" was all that Megoosa could say, as we began running from the quartet of death. This day was surely turning out to be something, that's for sure, as we spotted a ladder, climbed up it, and began running for sheer life atop the roofs of the city apartments, the hammerhoods not far behind. Honestly, why was fate oh so cruel?

0o0o0o0o0o0o

In the midst of all this, however, Bulma was busy trying to get her walkie-talkie to work, along with trying to revive Chi-Chi.

"Come on, you stupid thing, I don't have all day!" she cried out into the wind while trying to shake Chi-Chi out of her daze. Just when she was about to give up and throw the damn thing on the road, it finally crackled to life.

"Hey… who is this?" a familiar voice spoke, one Bulma was rather glad to hear right now. I mean, she had nearly face-planted herself in front of a statue! Would you be in any better shape in that situation, besides cracking your skull wide open?

"Yamcha, boy am I glad to hear you! Listen, you gotta get here! Chi-Chi fainted because she ran into an elephant statue, the kids ran away, and I'm pretty sure the people here are going to start a riot since we destroyed sacred property!" Bulma yelped out. At this point, she was done, both figuratively and mentally. She just needed a nice soak in a tub and a good nap, anything but this. Since Vegeta hadn't gotten one of the walkie-talkies, calling them "useless human trash", Yamcha was going to have to be her Plan B for the kids.

"Bulma, you'd better be joking around right now, because if all that really happened, we both know your privacy is going to hell. Kami, the newspapers will be all over it by tomorrow! What about the kids, at least, tell me you saw where they went!" Yamcha exclaimed over the line. He really hadn't expected this much chaos to happen from those kids, it was kind of incredible how they managed to elude both Bulma and Chi-Chi, who had dealt with Saiyans for years. But he didn't have time to waste admiring potential foes, as minuscule of a threat as they were. The quicker they were caught, the sooner they could get answers from the mystery kids.

"I'm sorry; Yamcha… but I don't kn…." Bulma started, before she abruptly cut off. As she cocked her vision upward, to the left, she saw a boy, along with two girls, running away from what seemed to look like a quartet of hooded hammer swingers, atop the roofs of the buildings in the street. A cloud also was accompanying them, ferrying them between the gaps between each roof. Occasionally, she saw the occasional icicle crash into one of the hammerhoods, as she dubbed them, as the trio continued to run for dear life.

No doubt about it, it was the kids, and judging from the speed they were pacing away at, she, Goku, and the others weren't the only ones after them.

"Yamcha! The kids are here! At the corner of 34th street, and they're running on the rooftops from some crooks! Get over here now!" Bulma exclaimed into the walkie-talkie, half-shocked, yet half-relieved also.

"No worries, I'm turning into 35th street right now. I'll be able to get them in a minute flat. Besides, what's the worst that they could do?" Yamcha stated, Bulma already picturing the grin gracing his face, a the line was cut.

Bulma, now done with that, began to slowly realize that she still had to apologize for their actions, they had cracked a statue for the festival after all, and the people standing around her looked more

"Uh….look, I'm sorry. Here, this much should pay for a new statue, right?", she sheepishly chuckled, as she handed the man closest to her, that had been holding the statue, a roll of zeni, around 100,000 zeni, and began to walk away, though not before a hand grabbed her shoulder.

"Miss… I'm sorry, but we'll need more." the man spoke, with a thick accent

"How much more?" Bulma stated, she had expected the statue to be expensive, but 100,000 zeni should have covered the cost. _Unless…_ , Bulma thought, as a panic began to run through her.

"This Ganesha statue was given a slightly thick gold plating, of nearly 24 karats. The statue costs nearly 6 million rupees back home. We have another, but this one must be fixed." the man spoke once more, frown placed on his face, but it didn't seem like he was mad at Bulma. Rather, it looked like he was worried that she would have to spend more than she had.

Running the calculations in her head, Bulma's eyes nearly popped out of her sockets, "OVER 1 MILLION ZENI! KAMI, WHAT DID I DO TO DESERVE THIS?!

"If you don't want to pay for the damages, you can leave them to your friend here, you know." the man spoke once more but quickly stopped when she saw Bulma's expression

"Are you out of your mind?! My friend here lives in the country! She would die in debt if I did that!" Bulma cried out angrily, much to the neighbor folks shock. They hadn't met such a feisty women in their entire lives. Well, except for maybe angry Indian moms. No seriously, that plus a sandal equals hell on earth.

Realizing at that point that these people were rather devout, and so, such an accident could cause great anger, and great damage to her reputation, she hung her head in shame and promised to pay out the cost in installments, monthly. The neighbor-folk agreed to this much, feeling pity that she would have to pay for another's mistake. With that finished, Bulma called up a taxi and drove home. She was going to have to do a lot of explaining to her father, not to mention Vegeta when he didn't start getting his GR upgrades on time because she was busy getting this fiasco sorted out. If there was one thing she got annoyed at from him, it was his insistence to get stuff, no matter how preoccupied a person was with other work.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Goddamnit, don't these hammerhoods quit?!", I cried out loud, casting crack for what could be the fifth time in ten minutes, as I ran for dear life, holding my thobe up with one hand for better-running footwork, and holding a frying pan in the other.

"Anybody need a kabuff? You might need to wait a minute!", Slalin cried, waving her iron pole in front of the enemy to put some distance between us, as she ran backward temporarily.

Meanwhile, Megoosa had been using her twin boomerangs to try to increase the distance that Slalin was already creating. We didn't have time for a fight, certainly not now. The longer we stayed there, the more of a sitting duck we were for the z-fighters. And honestly, the fact that we had managed to get Bulma and Chi-Chi off our trails was a miracle in itself. I didn't know what we would've done had we gotten caught, there just wouldn't have been a way to talk ourselves out of it! We just didn't have the time, I thought to myself. I guess the old Quranic proverb is true then, man really is at a loss of the time. Too much to do, and not enough hours to do it.

"Zain, another Crack spell! Like now!" Slalin called, snapping me out of my running daze. Complying, I released another icicle to crash into the hammerhoods, disrupting their movements. At this rate, we were going to burn our mana through and through, and to be frank with you, I did not want my cerebrum to be mush on a roof wall! I kind of like my body intact here, you know!

"Guys, we can't keep doing this! We'll run out of mana, and those things are definitely stronger than us in a group of four! If those things score even one crit, one of us is fainting, no doubt about it!" I stated, trying to insinuate the idea that a new plan was in order, as the Nimbus ferried us across another roof gap. The poor thing felt oddly wet, and to be honest, if I was in its place, I'd be nearly pissing myself just the same as it was right now.

"Slalin! Zain! Brace yourselves! The next building is a dead end! Ready your weapons! Slalin recast your support spells! It is imperative that we defeat these things or these hammerhoods will slow us down, and it will only be a matter of time until they capture us!" Megoosa cried aloud.

"I am sooo not ready for this. How about you Slalin?" I stated, trying to put in some small talk to ease the situation. Unfortunately for me, Slalin had gone off her rocker and into Marron-hysteric mode.

"DOES IT LOOK LIKE I'M OKAY? THIS IS THE SECOND TIME TODAY WEVE NEARLY DIED OR HAVE GOTTEN TAKEN AGAINST OUR WILL. PLUS, THOSE CRAZY LADIES SCARED THE CRAP OUT OF ME! AT THIS POINT, GOING BACK HOME SOUNDS LIKE A WALK IN THE PARK! I'M TOO BEAUTIFUL TO DIE, I TELL YOU, AND TOO YOUNG TOO!" Slalin cried out loud, wailing in terror.

"Megoosa, remind me to smack some sense in her!" I cried out, as I landed atop the dead-end roof.

"Don't worry about that Zain; focus on the problem at hand. I assure you, Slalin's disciplinations will come to pass.", Megoosa chuckled darkly, as she swung out both her boomerangs once more, only this time, she was out for blood. There was a feral intensity you could see, captured in her eyes. She was out for the thrill of the fight. Had she just gotten some spikier hair, a tail, and maybe ditched the gray clothes for a fighting suit of some sort, she would've looked like a full up Saiyan.

Nodding at her, I helped Slalin get up from the Nimbus, quivering slightly as she was, as the Nimbus itself sped right behind a wall atop the roof. Luckily for me at least, Slalin snapped out of it and managed to position herself right next to Megoosa, pole at the ready. Taking my position next to her, I lowered my frying pan, took a deep breath, tried to relax a little, and keep my gaze steady on the targets. I tell you, though, the adrenaline coursing through my veins made me feel like my heart was ready to jump right out of my chest! Damn epinephrine, always getting you too jittery...

When the first hammerhood got atop the roof, Megoosa let out a battle cry, "CHARGE! FOR LORD KINGSLEY!", and with that, the battle began in earnest. Slalin immediately cast kabuff, strengthening our defenses, while Megoosa and both went onto the offensive, or in my case, I attempted to. Many a time, I took a step a back and tried to cast a crack spell, only to realize, to my frustration, that the hammerhoods had caught on, using their hammers to break the icicle. Realizing this, I switched back to my frying pan, until a little thought danced into my head.

Looking back at my magic-Ki comparison hypothesis, it should be possible to mold the crack spell to my own wishes and design. Trying to come up with a suitable shape to make an AOE spell, similar to kacrack in design. Finally, and after a damn long time too, I came up with a suitable shape, an ice crystal that would quickly ram into a distracted enemy Megoosa had struck at, which would then discharge ice rods, sharpened at the ends, to pierce the remaining hammerhoods. It would have the shape of a spiked ball if you could picture it.

Meanwhile, Slalin had gone off her rocker again, as she mercilessly began beating a hammerhood upside the head with her pole, stealing its hammer and running around using it to beat anything else in the vicinity, cackling like someone gone mad.

"AHAHAHAHAHA, THIS IS THE BEST FUN I'VE HAD IN AGES!" she screeched, as she beat down the first hammerhood, who fell down in defeat only mere seconds later.

"MEGOOSA, REMIND ME TO MAKE SURE SHE NEVER GOES CRAZY!" I shrieked at the top of my lungs.

"A BIT TOO LATE FOR THAT, ZAIN. BESIDES, SHE'S A MUCH BETTER FIGHTER THIS WAY! SOPHISTICATION IS USELESS WITHOUT STRENGTH BEHIND IT, I SAY!" she retorted in return, to my own frustration. Not only would I be severely sore after this battle, I'd be dealing with two blood-thirsty slimes. Allah knows how I was going to deal with all of that.

However, as I saw Megoosa strike one of the hammerhoods from a distance suitable enough, I made my move. Making the spell in my own design, I began to hold upward, above my head, much like the spirit bomb, or the moosifer method of casting spells. I had just nearly finished making the spikes when I realized I had forgotten the most important thing of all.

I hadn't given my attack a name.

 _Oh, crapbaskets! Uh, what would sound suitable for this thing…._ , I thought, though not before a hammer went sailing over my head.

"ZAIN WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? OOZE THE DAMN SPELL INSTEAD OF TRYING TO ACT PRETTY!" Slalin fumed out, enraged at my delay.

"Alright, alright! Cracking Pipe Bomb!" I screamed, to be met with stupefied looks from both Megoosa and Slalin.

"HEY I'M NOT GOOD WITH THIS STUFF, DONT JUDGE ME.", I screamed defensively, trying to see just how well this spell technique would work. It immediately went, with a flick of my hand, into one of the hammerhoods, just as intended. Taken aback by the sudden shift in the trajectory of the crack spells, it got hit point blank, and stumbled backward a few feet. The other two (Slalin's psychotic stupor had managed to make one run in terror and drop its loot, after suffering near fatal blows), lowered their guard, thinking it was all over, discounting the spikes as simply decoration. _Perfect, this attack is going to hit them right where it hurts!_ I thought, an evil grin coming to my face.

"Eject!" I bellowed, and the spikes immediately sprung out of their icicle core. The hammerhoods, taken aback, took the situation as well as I predicted, the poor things literally got stabbed, and they both fell down, blacking out. We then went about on business, pocketing the gold and taking any items by the hammerhoods, took stock, and got back up again.

"You know Zain, if you need help in the name department, you could ask me. It was a pretty good start… for an amateur." Slalin sneered derisively.

However, I was not going to be put down so easily, "Yeah right. Like you can do any better. Besides, at least, I have an elemental attack, unlike some people." I drawled out, enunciating each and every word.

Taken aback, Slalin's face was filled with shock, soon to be replaced with childish fuming, "Why you… if it weren't' for me, you'd be a puddle of slime right now! Who gave you that kabuff, huh?"

However, I was in a bickering mood, and this was only just getting fun. Trying to keep the act going, I countered in full, "Well if you want to play that way, who was the one who finished off the two stragglers?", a smirk coming to my face.

"Slalin, Zain…" Megoosa stated, trying to divert our attention, but our own egos had unfortunately shut everything out, to her own exhaustion.

"OH PLEASE. ALL YOU DID WAS THROW A FANCY SPELL AT THEM. I ACTUALLY DID THE HEAVY LIFTING WITH ONE OF THEM.", Slalin replied dramatically, as she sized me up for what my next counter would be.

Taken a little aback by that verbal attack, I attempted to go on the offensive again, "Well I mean it's not like you could give your attack a fancy name. What are ya gonna call it, "Drunken Stupor?"", I sneered in full earnest

"ENOUGH! WILL YOU TWO SILENCE YOURSELVES AND TAKE A LOOK AHEAD!" Megoosa replied, angry enough that it looked like her eyes were leaking lava.

"Oh what is it now Me…" I started only to shut my mouth up again. Standing ahead of us, a good foot away, was the familiar scar-faced bandit the world adores as its whipping boy.

"Uh… Zain. On a scale of one to ten, how screwed are we?" Slalin replied, voice trembling sheepishly, drifting between nervousness and terror.

"Sixty-nine Slalin. Exactly sixty-nine."


	8. Chapter 8: Blundering Bandits

**Authors note: So, this chapter took an eternity and a half, and I hope you enjoy it. Although, seriously, if someone sounds OOC in this, my apologies. It's my first try at writing here, so I'm still learning the trade here. Anyway, enough talk, let's get moving!**

 **Chala- A burn**

 **Kulfi- Indian Ice cream, it's usually in a cone shape, rather than a bar shape, flavored from anything from milk skins (malai) to classic mangoes and pistachoes.**

Yamcha stared at the kids for a while, analyzing the view before him. They all had definitely been in some rough scrapes; they looked like they had been run ragged, their clothes slightly worn. However, as they had managed to beat up an entire group of hammer-wielding maniacs, perhaps he should give them credit where it was due. They certainly had potential that was for sure.

What Yamcha didn't understand, however, was the trio of harrowed eyes that looked like those of a cornered animal. He wasn't going to hurt them or anything, and if they really knew him and the others, they would know that, so what was with the act?

"Alright, kid, show's over. Come on." Yamcha stated, waving a hand, not taking their eyes off of them. Although he knew he could outrun them, he really didn't want to make this difficult. This was becoming chaotic enough already.

The three shifted on their feet, and the girl, wearing blue, and looking like she had snapped out of some savage stupor, looked fit to run, the other won, clothed in gray, simply looked at him with a glare. It didn't affect him, he'd dealt with worse, but the message was clear.

 _You don't know what you're messing with._

The look alike Nimbus was hiding behind the three of them, quivering slightly, while the boy, looking surprisingly calm despite the surroundings, decided to open his mouth. What came out of it was enough to leave Yamcha with a stare of predictability.

"Yeah…no. We need to go to places" he stated, avidly, the other two nodding their heads in approval. As for the boy, he was just smiling eerily now.

 _What the hell is up with these kids? Seriously, they're harder to read than Piccolo! And what the heck was up with that smile of his? Are those two hypnotized by him or something? Whatever._ Yamcha thought, dismissing the thought. He was simply wasting time here, and he needed to get back to help Bulma on the double.

Walking forward, he eventually decided to break the unnerving silence, "Well, what're you waiting for? I've got things to do. You better not be trying to trick us again." Yamcha replied dryly.

"Jeez, we get it, geezer. Honestly, you would think the goddess would stop throwing trouble our way!", the blue girl responded, quite acidly.

"Slalin, mind your manners. You're still a princess, but you are in no way going to say that." The girl in gray replied with just as much coldness in her voice.

"Why not? After all, he's basically damned them all, hasn't he? And we're out of options now sis." Slalin replied sullenly, but also with venom. _There it is again… who's them? what are the "options"_? _Who ARE these people?_ Yamcha thought. Try as he might, he just couldn't get a mere read on them.

"Slalin, TMI!" the boy angrily warned, but with no more volume than a mere hiss, his voice coming out very carefully, almost… predetermined, in a peculiar sort of way.

"What? I'm pretty sure a village isn't important for them, so why bother? They're far too powerful anyway to stoop so low to look at such a tiny situation anyway." Slalin retorted back, sizing up Yamcha all the while.

"Honestly, just shut up for a couple minutes. Do you want a wolf fang fist to the face? Or better yet, how about the Kamehameha special? Honestly, quit insulting him. He's been in far worse straits than we've been in. I've told you the stories, haven't I?" the boy replied, defensively. Yamcha was a little shocked at this, not expecting the boy to take a conciliatory tone about him, much less defend him outright.

"What Zain says is true. I don't know who this man is Slalin, but he has seen more than his fair share of battle. What is it that I always tell you, hmm?" Megoosa inquired

"Looks are deceiving, sis. I know. Anyway, you guys, pray to whatever you think is in heaven. We'll need a miracle to get out of this." Slalin stated in a half groan, as the three began to walk towards Yamcha.

"Not so fast. Did you think you were off the hook yet? You're telling me EVERYTHING. Where the hell is this kingdom you need to save, how do you know so much about us, and what's with those weird powers you have?", Yamcha demanded. He had had enough of these games. Honestly, these kids really knew how to beat round the bush!

The two girls turned to the boy, Zain really, who still had that smile on his face. _What the hell is up with this kid? He's just been sitting around for the past few minutes now.,_ Yamcha thought.

The kid walked up toward him, and looked up, "A boy's dream, too real to be fraud, parasols descending from heaven, a cloud whose adventure hit something far from a lucky seven, a tree that served as something far more, the garbage that was more valuable than gold and the surprise closets can hold..."

Yamcha slanted his eyes a little, trying to show his impatience, "Real funny kid. Stop giving me crap and tell me what the hell you really know."

However, the kid wasn't done, spilling a mouthful of cryptic words, "The greed of metal as it inspires, and the pain that it wires. A tower that stretches, scratching the sky. A village in tatters, divided by clear signs. An unworldly bunch of denizens, and magic to boot, and a pain where it hurts too." the boy stated. Yamcha had been trying so hard to figure out what those words meant, that he didn't even notice what was aiming for him. His pride had taken ahold of him and blinded him from what was to come.

"Zain what are you-..!" came the loud shout from one of the girls, though not before the sound of an object cutting through the air quickly was made.

0o0o0o0o0o

Yamcha smirked, looking at what the kid had attempted to do, for someone so small, the kid definitely had some attitude. Unfortunately for him, his plot had fallen through.

"Zain, what the hell! WAS THAT PLAN A, BECAUSE IF IT WAS, I'M GOING TO BEAT YOU SENSELESS!" Slalin frothed in anger while Megoosa was evidently trying to calm Slalin the hell down.

"Look, Kami used that trick in one of the Tenkaichi Budokai via head-butting the area. It's a man's greatest weakness." I recited smugly, even while being fully supported by Yamcha's hand, which had caught hold of my leg by way of simple instinct at this point, which well… you know where that thing was heading.

"Kid, you've got guts, I'll give you that. But didn't you underestimate me a little? I thought you knew better." Yamcha stated, gloating at the fact that he had succeeded where Goku had failed. _He wasn't joking when he said he knew us, huh? This kid is all sorts of strange._ Yamcha thought.

"Yamcha, do you take me for an idiot? You're one of the strongest people alive on this earth, you could blow this planet to kingdom come if you wanted to, though I'm sure you don't. Look, just unhand us, and let us on our way. We won't cause trouble, I promise. Besides, what we want to do isn't here anyway. If you're concerned we're going to go bonkers, you don't need to worry." Zain replied, his tone now changing to something close to conversational.

"Why should I believe you? You have been going on one hell of a joyride already." Yamcha snarled out.

"That attitude…. Isn't going to do much good for you. As they say, fall for it once, shame on you. Fall for it twice, shame on _me_.", Zain replied acidly

"What the hell are you going on about again? Are you trying to stall for time or something? I do have you in a leg grip after all." Yamcha called. This boy was just a big mystery. You thought you had found the core, but then you just had to find another layer to peel off.

0o0o0o0o0o

Megoosa stared at the man, who she know knew as Yamcha, and as his hostage bartered with him, a sly little plan wormed its way into her head.

 _Keep him busy Zain. Let him lose his focus. You always said his cockiness was his downfall. I will surely… bring him to a halt, no?_ , Megoosa mused with a dark smile, as she held a hand behind her, as it began to charge with a pale blue hue of sparks. What was amazing, though, was how naive Zain was being. It looked like as if Zain was sincerely saying stuff to him, rather than trying to trick him. How strange…..

0o0o0o0o0o

"Yamcha, I may not be the best person for advice, but heed this. That attitude will destroy you. As Jackie Chun said during the World Martial Arts tournament, all those years ago, that pride will only lead to your defeat. Growing vain like this is not something you should do. It's made you lose too many things already. Please, promise me you won't let your attitude get in the way of your thinking." Zain replied. Yamcha was a little shocked at this, this kid almost sounded like he was pleading, no, begging, for him to do what he said. _He really is just a kid… a really crafty one maybe, but he's still a kid. Maybe I am being a little too harsh…,_ Yamcha thought. However, he wanted to make sure the kid was truly sincere before he took heed of his words.

"And what if I don't want to listen to you?" Yamcha replied curiously. He wanted to probe the boy for more information, a better reaction if you will. He hadn't gotten a peep out of this boy, and those riddles were basically useless. Once again, the question of identity had been left in the lurch.

"Then you will fail once more. You've lost everything, and the sad part is, it's not even your fault, in a strange way, you could say destiny had ordained for your failure. If you want to remain strong, train, train and train. I know it sounds silly but also try to refrain from trying to get the power in a Saiyan fashion. We really don't need you do bang yourself up in the GR and get the Dragon Ball emergency hospital running.", the kid chuckled as if remembering some long lost comedic memory.

"What the hell do you mean by that? So are you asking me to train or not?" Yamcha replied. Now this was confusing, really. The Saiyans trained the hardest out of all of them, and this know-it-all kid was telling him not to do that? Also, what was with the destiny crap? He was his own man, not some puppet to control by the strings.

"Look, judging from your tournament videos, which were amazing by the way, you're a speedy one, a hot shot if you will." the boy chuckled at this, and almost immediately, Yamcha was reminded of King Kai. Boy, this kid might have the smarts, but his humor is just terrible, Yamcha thought, a small smirk playing on his lips at the reminiscence of long ago events, back when he could actually still fight somewhat, before all the crazy transformations, powerups, and aliens, when fighting had just been black and white for the most part, and nothing in between.

Yamcha blinked a little at that, a kid like him had seen him fight at the tournaments, "Well… uh…. it was nothing really. Just some simple skills." he laughed sheepishly, he always had been a sucker for compliments.

"Anyway, you seem like a glass cannon of sorts, easy to dish out pain, but it looks like more physical fighters can steamroll over you. With that, focus on your evasive skills and attack delivery, though remember to have some bulk, that way they won't be able to know what hit 'em. You need to get over the Saiyans and focus on your playing field, humanity. Once you get to Krillin's level, maybe we can expand our horizons some more", Zain replied, shifting into a highly analytic tone, which betrayed some giddy amusement.

"So he's like me, huh. I guess great minds do think and act alike." Slalin butted in, sporting a prideful grin.

"Slalin, you're a disgrace to that proverbial. Yamcha is ten, no a million times what you are. Compared to him, you're just an angry old lady. How did you even manage to butt into this conversation anyway?" Zain replied.

"EXCUSE ME? HOW ABOUT I GO AND WHACK YOUR ASS TO NEXT YEAR, WILL THAT UP ME ON THE SCALES!?" Slalin shrieked, her pole suddenly lowered in a threatening fashion.

"Okay, now look. HE STRONG, YOU WEAK. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?" Zain replied, smugly.

"HOW DARE YOU MOCK MY INTELLIGENCE YOU LITTLE SON OF A …", Slalin finished that one off with a bunch of expletives that would've made an army shiver.

Megoosa, at this, could simply only turn her head away and look at Yamcha, "I am not associated with her in any fashion.", as she proceeded to do a light facepalm.

"You're lucky you know, back in the day, Bulma was ten times as worse. Then again, I wasn't much better myself." Yamcha chuckled,

"It's a shame we have to be on such opposite sides. You seem like a very kind individual. You all do, really." Megoosa replied, with a hint of disappointment that such a scenario couldn't simply metastasize forth.

"You don't need to be, you know," Yamcha replied, with a small smirk.

"It is far too troublesome to you all, I'm afraid. You would simply be miring yourself into undesired trouble. These are forces you cannot comprehend at work here." Megoosa replied icily. Yamcha looked at her for any signs that she truly thought to the contrary, but there were none. _Whatever this thing is that's going on….. it's definitely bad. I'll have to go and talk to the gang about this. These kids aren't your average bum, something really strange is going on here…._ , Yamcha thought

"Anyway, I'm still guessing you want to get rid of me, huh? Sorry, but business is business. If you guys want to get out of here, you're going to have to try to escape me. But kid, why would you help me if you know I'm gonna stop you?" Yamcha spoke, getting back up. _Man, I really didn't want to have to come to this, but this is the only option. If I just try to take them back, they'll probably try to run or something. Without Ki-sensing, I'm left in the dark against these guys_. Yamcha thought. But still, it struck him odd, that the kid running for his life away from him was giving him life advice.

Zain had a moment of discomfort at this, just a second, before reverting back to normal, "Consider it nothing more than a kind gesture. You've already gotten the short end of the stick too much in life. It… would be nice if you got lucky, snagged your dreams for once. Enough of that, though. It seems you're ready to fight. You're not letting us through easy, are you?"

Yamcha said nothing to this, but inwardly, he felt himself mentally shaking himself for an answer, _if this kid really knows me, he sure is being nice about it. Why isn't he using his knowledge against me? Is he really just doing this out of his heart, even if we are on opposite sides?_

Yamcha however, decided to dismiss these thoughts for the time, and smirked, "Damn right I'm not."

However, seeing Yamcha get up, Megoosa fired a round of blue electricity from her fingers, which crackled like mad.

"Nice try, but that won't be enough to put me down!" Yamcha called as he shot a Ki blast of his own. It collided with the electricity, making it dissipate. At this, Slalin and Zain both jumped up.

"Finally, something to do! Kabuff!" Slalin exclaimed in joy, as she strengthened our defenses.

Meanwhile, Zain looked like he was charging up some sort of attack. To Yamaha's surprise, he was forming a huge icicle, from just the tips of his hands.

"Kid, I don't know what to tell you. You're the first person I've ever seen do something like that, and that's saying something..." Yamcha spoke.

"It's not much, but it's what you have that counts, right? CRACK!" Zain yelled, almost amused, as the icicle fell.

At this, Yamcha lazily punched the incoming projectile, breaking the ice into pieces, and then let surprisingly, a punch fly. Not much, but a punch still.

"Kabuff! Kabuff!" Slalin exclaimed once more, as magic seals worked round the clock to keep us okay. At this point, our defenses should have been solid.

Yamcha's punch hit Megoosa, and the blowback made her go flying off of the building while the two of us stared in avid shock at this.

Slalin balked at this show of impressive strength, "H...He's a monster! I've never seen Megoosa punched with that much force, and she's taken on cheater cheetahs! That punch knocked her even with 3 kabuffs!" with that, she went rushing to the building's side to see if she was alright. Sure enough, she had managed to grab hold of the buildings edge before she tottered down. A good thing too, the building was a good few stories high, she could've cracked her neck from here if she fell!

Yamcha looked a little sheepish at that, and I couldn't blame him. He probably hadn't thought of holding back.

"Yamcha, you haven't got murder on your hands. She's fine. Come on Megoosa, ally oop!" I spoke, as I, along with Slalin helped her up.

Getting up after getting back on the roof though looking more than a little dazed, bleeding quite a bit actually, she smirked devilishly, "My turn", and swung both her sharpened boomerangs at her target.

Managing to dodge both with a simple swing of his neck, Yamcha immediately decided to counter the girl, Slalin. She hadn't been doing anything but using her weird powers, but he'd begun to notice a disturbing correlation between her chanting and the decreasing effectiveness of his physical attacks. _Could she be reducing my punch power? That punch should've knocked that girl out. Well, can't let that happen._

Seeing a glare in his eyes, Zain's eyeballs widened, "Slalin, he knows your support! Get ready!" he screamed.

Barely managing to see Yamcha actually move, Slalin almost didn't lift her pole up in time, and by the sheer luck of it all, managed to block off most of the force of his punch. However, the pole paid a steep price for that, fracturing in two.

"W...HEY, YOU BROKE MY STAFF!" Slalin screamed as she began to register what had actually happened.

"Yeah, so what?", Yamcha spoke, egging her on. He must have thought he was making her fight better by doing this, I suppose, it was a gag I'd seen in the show a few times. However, what I hadn't realized was that he hadn't moved from his close position. He had thought that by removing her weapon, she, and thus us, were defenseless.

However, I realized that Yamcha may have sealed his own coffin. Slalin had rather treasured that pole, cleaning it, using it everywhere, and carrying it everywhere. Hell, it was basically her kid. I mean, it's not like she coddled it or anything, that would've just been odd, but she did really treasure it. I guess it's because it reminded her of home maybe, or she just really liked it. Slimes always did strike me as the kind to use staffs.

"You….You", Slalin whispered out, almost as if she was trying to repeat a mantra

Yamcha didn't realize what was going to hit him until Slalin lunged at him with a fireball.

"NOBODY BREAKS MY STUFF, YOU OLD GEEZER! FRIZZ!" Slalin screamed as she threw a fireball, which seemed to be a lot bigger than normal due to all the anger in her system, square in the chest, too fast for him to dodge due to his close proximity. The next thing I knew, Yamcha was screaming, a little in shock, and a little in fear probably, as the flames had begun to consume his clothes, and get to his flesh. I had not seen that coming. After all, wasn't Ki flammable? Then again, humans aren't flame retardant. The fact that he was wearing what looked like cotton clothes, which are very flammable mind you, made it worse.

"Oh my god, Yamcha! Slalin, get a bottle, NOW! Megoosa, paralyze him so he doesn't move! If he keeps on fidgeting like that, the flames are gonna spread!" I ordered.

Megoosa quickly let the electrical discharge fly from her fingers, paralyzing the man. Slalin hurriedly fumbled with a bottle of water, and I quickly poured the whole thing on his flame. The blaze petered out, but Yamcha looked like he was left with a rather nasty burn. The chala looked rather bad, hot red, and blistered.

"Great, now what are we gonna do? His friends are going to kill us now for this!" I screamed out loud, flinging my hands upwards.

Megoosa then proceeded to hurriedly fish out, from a small pouch she had, a tulip-like bulb, and a leaf, covered in all sorts of herbal materials, as she began to rip off some of Yamcha's dress to get to the burn area, and no, not in that way, "Hold this, I have to administer the medicinal herb.", Megoosa stated.

Meanwhile, Slalin looked guilty beyond words, she looked like as if she wanted to speak, but no words came out. I couldn't blame her if I tried, rage can be a very nasty thing in certain cases.

0o0o0o0o

Yamcha had seen many things in his life.

But a fireball-throwing girl? That was definitely a new one. He hissed in pain at his burn, wincing. However, what was new was the fact that his legs were stiff.

He tried to move them. No response.

He then tried his hands. Again, no response.

Panic gripping him, Yamcha began to flail wildly, before an authoritarian voice cut in.

"Control yourself Yamcha. Stay still so I can administer this medicinal herb." he heard a stern voice call, only to find the gray clothes girl above him.

"Wha… What did you do to me?" Yamcha replied in a dazed fashion, trying to register his eyes as to what was going on now.

"I paralyzed you, of course. What else? I couldn't have you flailing about like that." Megoosa stated dryly, as she finished the application of the medicine.

That took Yamcha by surprise, he remembered how Goku had told him General Blue could do that, but he had never come across someone like him.

"Wh...What Ki technique did you use?" Yamcha breathed out slowly, winding in pain.

"Oh yes, Zain had told me of that energy source. You use it for fighting. No, this is simple electricity. I am a man o' war after all." Megoosa stated, electricity crackling on her fingertips as a way to demonstrate.

"You're an alien, right?" Yamcha spoke once more. Even if he was paralyzed, he was determined to get some answers, one way or another. If he had to ask, so be it.

"...Not quite. We are visitors from another dimension. More like residents now, as we were chased out of our homeland. In fact, these aren't even our true forms." Megoosa explained

Yamcha tried to comprehend that for a little, until he asked once more, "So what do you really look like?" Yamcha asked curiosity bubbling.

Megoosa scrunched her eyebrows as she thought, "According to Zain… I would like like what this world calls a jellyfish, only with a face, gray and blue. My sister over there, the one that burned you, would look like a teardrop shaped drop of slime with a face. Zain is well… he is just himself. It's harder to explain how he works; you would have to speak directly to him."

"Huh. Anyway, what are you guys gonna do?" Yamcha asked.

"Us? Get out of here and complete our quest, of course." Megoosa stated. Yamcha took those words as food for thought.

"If I can ask… what quest? What's so important that you need to do it, even if it means dealing with us?" Yamcha asked. He was curious about her answer.

Megoosa opened her mouth as if to say something, but quickly shut it, "Zain over there already gave you the hints. It is up to you to deduce what they truly mean. My lips are sealed." With that, Megoosa began to administer the medical herb.

 _Well, so much for that. Guess I'm going to have to remember what Zain said. But what the hell do parasols; closets, trash, and metal have to do with each other? I might as well think up of something, it's not like I can move from here anyway._ Yamcha thought. It was going to be a long day for him, between his paralysis and his mental sleuthing for answers.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Bulma was not a very patient woman, one should know this.

She was rummaging through the Indian quarter once more, having gotten a shower after leaving Chi Chi back home at Capsule Corp. She still hadn't woken up, and the last Bulma had checked on her, she was mumbling about teaching Gohan calculus in her dreams. This had supposed to just have been a rendezvous with Yamcha and the mystery kids, but things were quickly going south from that plan.

"IT'S BEEN NEARLY AN HOUR! Where is that jerk?! First there was this statue bull, and now Yamcha finds it fit to just drop off the face of the earth!" Bulma seethed, her face slowly turning red once more. Honestly, as if things couldn't get any worse!

Deciding to try her luck, she decided to radio Tien and their group, who were the closest in the vicinity to her, if she had remembered right.

"Hey, anybody here?" she called, waiting for a response

"Oh, Bulma! So, have you seen them?" Launch replied, and judging from her voice, it was still her blue side. Thank kami for that, because they really didn't need a public shooting right about now.

"I wish! Those idiots were running around on some buildings an hour ago, and Yamcha went after them! I haven't seen him since!" Bulma screeched in frustration

"Oh my, I nearly forgot! Tien wants to talk to you." Launch yelped, and there was a shift in the tone

"Bulma. Thank goodness, you're safe, right?" Tien's voice called from the other side of the line

"Of course, I'm safe! How the hell would I be talking to you?!" Bulma snapped. She knew she shouldn't have done that, but she was really nearing the end of her rope here.

"Good, but this is serious. Chiatzou and I found some rather… unpleasant things lurking in the alleys a while back." Tien paused, as if not knowing to phrase his news.

"Do you mean a thug… or…?" Bulma spoke hesitantly, not sure where this was going

"Well… there were…. demon candles coming out of the garbage bins." Tien said, pausing

"Did you say "candles"? I did hear you right that time, right?" Bulma called. She had seen some weird things in her life, but if there was one thing she knew, it was that the undead didn't exist! You were either dead, alive, or had a halo floating atop your head like a holy onion slice.

"It's… complicated. Chiatzou might be able to explain better." Tien managed to spit out, and there was a shift in the voice again.

"Oh, hi Bulma! So you were asking about the candles?" Chiatzou spoke excitedly

"Yeah… just… what the hell?" Bulma called, a little stupefied by Tien's findings

"It seems like someone animated them, probably using a mixture of magic involving summoning and animation spells. Someone took an evil spirit and stuffed it inside a candle mold, or that may have happened by itself. They basically are trapped souls, in a sense." Chiatzou lectured. Having come from a line of Jiangshi's originating from Mifan, Chiatzou had long since gained an understanding of the unseen, even possessing some useful powers of his own in the psychic department. Although to be frank, he hated how everyone thought he had to walk like as if he was hopping about in a potato sack. He could FLOAT around to get to places, after all.

"Did… Did those kids make them?" Bulma questioned, having abandoned all sense of scientific reason. At this point, anything was fair game.

"I doubt it. None of them looked like they even had the potential to make one. Besides, these things look like they're wild. If those kids had made them, they would have gone back to them, and…" Chiatzou spoke, though not before Bulma interrupted

"...They haven't come here, so they can't be theirs." Bulma finished the phrase for Chiatzou, as the cogs in her head worked once more.

"Exactly. You said that Yamcha went for those kids right? Are you in the same area that he left from?" Chiatzou asked, probing for information

"Yeah. I'm like a block away. Just come here quickly, alright! This is getting so annoying!", Bulma called, then clicked the walkie-talkie off, as she continued to wait, as the time went round and round on the clocks, and the sun zipped away on its predestined course in the sky, though not before a thought struck her.

"Oh, what the hell…" Bulma said, as she took her phone, dialed in Yamcha's number, and put it to her ear. Besides, even if someone managed to try to track her down if the phone fell into the wrong hands, Vegeta would probably murder the person before they could lay a finger on her.

0o0o0o0o0o

As this was occurring, however, our paralysis medic was busy, very busy indeed. Taking the tulip-shaped bulb from before, she took it so that Yamcha could see it.

"This is a moonwort bulb, which heals paralysis where we're from. When your friends arrive, which will not be far from now, tell them to administer this to you." Megoosa stated dryly

Yamcha nodded and Megoosa, her work finished, left his side, proceeding to take a viewpoint at another section of the building. At this point, Zain decided to speak up.

"Hey, Megoosa. Mind asking Yamcha for his phone? We can't just leave his friends in the dark here. I mean, he is paralyzed." Zain called

"Fair enough. Yamcha, hand over your communication device." Megoosa asked calmly

"How the hell am I supposed to that?! Last time I checked, my arms went dead an hour ago!", Yamcha snapped angrily

"Yeesh, there's no need to get mad, geezer. Just tell us where your damn phone is.", Slalin butted in.

Yamcha was seriously considering caving her face later, but considering the best he could do was glare at her now, that's what he did, "Yeah, ask the guy who's paralyzed to do work, huh? It's in my left pocket." Yamcha grumbled, and with that, Megoosa fished out his phone quickly and then gave it to Zain.

"Come on Zain, make that technological head of yours work here." she replied dryly, to then go and walk away to another corner of the roof.

Surprisingly, swiping the phone got me the desired results. With a couple taps, I managed to get to Bulma's number. She seemed the best to know about this after all. Dialing the number, I let it ring for a while until a female voice clicked to life on the other side.

"Hello, who's this?" I got, and I couldn't help but snicker. I felt like I was conducting a prank call, but that might just be my immaturity showing. But hey, being an adult is overrated.

"You know who I am Bulma, or should I say… Muffin Button." I replied, and waited for the response.

"YOU! WHERE THE HECK DID YOU GO?!" Bulma shrieked, the sound fit to burst my ears. One could only shudder at what would occur if she got a bullhorn.

"Anyway, we kind of paralyzed Yamcha. You might want to come here and feed him a moonwort bulb we left to cure him. Kinda looks like a tulip bulb. Seriously, though, the score is 1-0 Bulma, how do you plan on fixing that?" I replied.

"Kid, I'm Bulma Briefs. If I want something, I get it, no exceptions. If you really know me, you know I don't like losing. I've faced kings and armies, seen emperors fall, engineered gear to counter killer robots, and even helped in getting rid of King Piccolo twenty years ago. Heck, I even managed to get the prince of a warrior race to marry me! But why in kami's name did you have to paralyze Yamcha of all people, he probably didn't even lay a hand on you, not to mention how the heck you managed to do it! He should've run circles around you people!" Bulma shouted

"Indeed, you have all of these accolades, Bulma, indeed you have, but the fun has only just begun. You have no idea what new anomalies are popping out of the woodwork, now do you?" I asked. I was basically probing her for reactions from her with my questions, and the results were simply wonderful. She was emptying out her entire persona out, like an overflowing basin.

"What do you mean anomalies?" Bulma replied, no demanded, on the other end. She was tense; I could hear that much in her breathing. It was slightly hitched. But she wasn't one to cower quickly; she would make a stand, gutsy as she was.

"Isn't it obvious, Bulma? Can my knowledge truly be found in this world? To know it, I would have had to be a friend of yours, especially considering the privy status some of these events hold. Now ask yourself this, do you know me?" I replied, succumbing to my guilty pleasure of having wanted to intellectually toy with someone such as herself in a scenario like this. Unfortunately, I may have divulged too much far too quickly.

"Well of course not, kid! Why the hell would I be having this conversation with you then! Get to the point and quit acting like such a snobby jackass already!"

Sighing, I took my phone off my ear to do some good quality thinking, this was clearly getting me nowhere, as I moaned to myself, **Aree, kuchbi nai cam kara!** (Ugh, nothing is working!), but then it hit me. _Aha! This'll get to her, no doubt! I smirked happily._ This plan would definitely catch her, like a fish in a pond. And as they say, to reel a person in, you need the hook, line, and sinker. I would have all three, and then some.

0o0o0o0o0o

While all of this was occurring, of course, Yamcha, Slalin, and Megoosa were busy just watching and waiting for Zain to finish his crazy phone call from hell.

"GODDESS, I'M SO BORED! MEGOOSA CAN WE SPELL FIGHT OR SOMETHING?" Slalin moaned, bored beyond words.

"Not now, Slalin. Besides, who knows when we'll be ambushed by foes again? We must conserve our mana." Megoosa stated dryly, annoyed at Slalin's rather sudden burst of activity. She had always been a rather jumpy girl, but her adventures in the city had, so it seemed, pumped her full of adrenaline, like as if the water supply was steeped in it. _Oh well, better this than the modest, silent princess of only a few weeks ago_ , Megoosa mumbled inwardly.

"Hey, your name is Slalin right?" Yamcha finally spoke, having been quiet for a while, which made Slalin stop groaning, finally having something to do.

"Yep, that's me. What is it?" Slalin replied cheerily, almost like as if she hadn't just cauterized the same man mere minutes before.

"The boy's dream that Zain was talking about… that was about him, wasn't it? I already get the part about that blue nimbus." Yamcha spoke slowly as if treading over an ocean of unease by just stating the thought.

Slalin simply shrugged her shoulders at this, not impressed, "Sorry, but that's still pretty shoddy mental work there. That was the most obvious stuff that you picked up on. The question now is, did you get anything else?" she spoke, leaning in to catalog his reaction.

Yamcha however, frustratingly began to lose his temper, "How am I supposed to get anything out of whatever the hell your friend said? He sounded like Baba when he said all that crap!"

Slalin, seeing this, couldn't help to feel a little bad for the poor fellow, and, despite her better judgment, decided to help him a little. Not too much, mind you, but just enough. Goddess, I hope this doesn't screw up anything, in the long run, I seriously don't need my kindness to bite me in the ass later, Slalin mused worriedly

"Alright. I'm only saying this. The closet and the trash have to do with people Zain met, and the metal has to do with a powerful army. That's all you're getting." Slalin spoke, loud and clear.

Yamcha's eyes widened a little at the army part, realizing that these kids were definitely mixed up into some very deep trouble. He wasn't a stranger to chaos, their group had had gone on a wild goose chase to smack sense into the Red Ribbon Army, after all, and countless other adventures over the years. But having fallen into silence, he began to put the pieces together, like a child looking over a jigsaw puzzle. _I don't care how long it takes; I'm going to crack this riddle. For the gang. They need to know about this_ , he thought, his face set in stone, steeped in determination. If there was a new threat coming to earth, these kids shouldn't have to be on the front lines.

All the while, however, Slalin looked at Yamcha once more, before turning away to look at the sun. So, he's onto our little game now, huh? Well, like it will matter anyway, we'll be sure to outrun these guys beforehand. But, I can see why Zain was slightly excited for all of this, for him, this all must be a giant game, in a strange, small portion of his head. After all, it's not every day you go head to head with the people you've seen as heroes of books and stuff, and this is only one person! I wonder, just how tough will the others be? Slalin thought, a slight hint of trepidation going through her now. If they caught them, it would be game over, simple as that. They would detain them for answers because they wouldn't trust them.

Unfortunately, they didn't have time for such frivolous activities.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

Meanwhile, as Yamcha was busy plotting away, I was busy trying to explain hypothetical physics to Bulma Briefs.

"Ok, so let me get this straight. You guys are from another dimension?" Bulma stated, a little drawn-out

"That's right. You remember Trunks right? The one you may or may not have hit on before you realized he was your son." I asked. I knew I was gonna get it for saying that, but the temptation as too good to resist.

I heard sputtering on the other end, before Bulma responded, "Y… Yeah. What about him? For your information, I didn't know he was my son, and he looked pretty handsome, so don't judge me!"

"Easy, Bulma, I'm not blaming you for acting that way. Anyway, he came from a time machine, from another timeline, right? That time machine ripped a hole through time and space, and that's how he got here, correct?" I lectured analytically

"Yeah, but what does that have to do with you guys?" Bulma asked, much to my exasperation, as I mused. _She's still not getting it?!_ _ **Arey, me bezzar hogya ab ye bat se!**_ **(** Oh, I'm so exhausted from this conversation!)

"Think about it for a minute. If you put us in Trunk's place, how could we have gotten here?" I continued, trying to drive the point home.

"So, you're telling me that a rip in the fabric of space-time just magically happened and dropped you guys here?" Bulma concluded, with what sounded like a hint of doubt

"That's the hypothesis I've come up with so far. I think I can also tell you which dimensions could come spiraling your way too." I said smugly. Oh, praise Allah for the gift of man's intelligence, because boy was I putting it to good use!

Bulma immediately sounded a little jolted, "Really? Well, come on kid, out with it already!"

"You guys, in my world, were created by a man named Akira Toriyama. Naturally, that means any of his works will come careening in. In fact, one of his other dimensions has already come crashing into here, Dragon Quest. Where do you think my friends came from, huh?" I stated, with a hint of pride in my voice. It had taken me some time to make up that theory, and a whole lot of brain searching too. Although, I felt a little bad for Bulma. After all, telling someone that they were made by someone else to fulfill their desires seems a little twisted and one the douche side of things.

"Well, aren't you gonna tell me more? That's awfully vague for a theory." Bulma edged in, demands ringing in her voice. Sure, the whole "You-were-created-by-someone" crap was really shocking, but she had more important stuff to do now. She could freak about it later.

"I like to call it the "Toriyama Thesis", but whatever. I'd say you guys might be hit by Chrono Trigger next, but there's also another set of possibilities altogether." I stated aloud.

"What would those be exactly, and what the hell is a Chrono Trigger?" Bulma called, now wanting to know the rest

"Well… the thing is. I'm from the real world. Judging from that, my presence here has probably destabilized things further. At this point, almost any fictitious universe close to you guys is fair game." I stated aloud, relating my theory to her.

"Okay… as much as I think you're crazy right now, I get the nagging feeling that you're actually right. Where the hell are you anyway? Last time I saw you guys, you were busy running like hell from those weird hooded creeps." Bulma spoke distrustfully

"Yeah, we're with Yamcha right now; actually, let me give the phone to him!" I called happily, as Yamcha eye's brightened up. I couldn't blame him. He'd been through all sorts of crazy today, and I felt like it was time to give the poor man a break.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Yamcha, there you are! Where the hell are you! Are you even okay?!" Bulma shrieked, concern laced into her words

"I'm fine Bulma. But, hurry up already!" Yamcha called, relieved that help was on the way.

"Honestly, I still don't understand what those kids managed to pull on you. I'm coming, just tell me where you are." Bulma asked, though not before a voice abruptly called

"There's no need for that. I'll send the dark nimbus your way so you can get to Yamcha." Zain stated plainly

"Oh…. uh… thanks?" Bulma called. For someone running from us, he's being awfully kind for some strange reason.

"Don't mention it. Anyway, I'll give the phone to Yamcha now. See ya!" Zain called. Bulma wanted to talk some more, but the kid just was too jumpy, and off he went, probably to another building.

"Heh, he's kinda like you, isn't he?", Yamcha said with what Bulma could imagine being a smile, and Bulma couldn't help but voice her agreement, as they both turned their ears to the remnants of the kids conversations.

"Oh, what a day! Hey, Zain you think we can get some kulfi?" Slalin called in the background

"I hope so! Where there's a will, there's a way!" Zain called,

Sighing at past memories of nostalgia, Bulma diligently spoke, "Yamcha, stay on the line. I need to be able to talk to you."

"No worries. Besides, what the hell am I gonna even do right now?" Yamcha spoke with what she could imagine was a grin. That man was optimistic even in the worst of situations, and it sometimes led to his own troubles.

Bulma moaned to herself at her predicament and picked herself up as she saw the telltale sign of an indigo cloud heading her way, its trail meandering in the sky.

Kami help her because today just wasn't her lucky day.


	9. Chapter 9:Cannibox Chaos

**Author's note: I'm back! Sorry for the little delay, work has just been a thorn in my side! (insert droning statement about how I don't own any franchise listed in this story). Also, if anybody's confused as to why this story got to the top of the updated list twice, its cause I had to review a chapter, hence I deleted it and stuck it in again. Anyway, enjoy!**

With Yamcha out of commission, things seem to finally be looking up. Our little gang was busy running to our freedom once more, although that didn't mean we stuck around to keep an eye on old scar face to see if he was alright like thieves in the middle of the night, if not for a few minutes. After Bulma found him of course, we hightailed it outta there. No need to garner further attention, I say.

"Well, that's taken care of. What's next?", I called aloud, hoping for a response. With Yamcha gone, we could go back to our carefree semi-vacation mode, even if only for a short while.

"You said we were going to go get some ice cream. So come on! I haven't had a good frozen dessert in weeks now! Zamoksva used to have the best sweets in the summer…", Slalin mused to herself, reminiscing about the old and the new

"I was more preferential for the savory foods of the summer, but to each their own.", Megoosa called

At this point, the line had thinned for the kulfis, and we were soon to be next. Each of us looked upward, debating over what flavor we would take.

"Zain, since your the only one who's ever had this crap, give us a recommendation.", Slalin called, as we shuffled ever forward to our dairy delight.

"Well, I almost always go with mango. It's traditional, tastes sweet, melts in the mouth, what more can ya ask for?", I replied, honestly and truthfully.

"Then I guess we'll go for that. I haven't had something fruity in ages now! Well, besides those lychees, but those taste a little weird.", Slalin shuddered, making a slight face of distaste.

"I for one, am curious about this dish. What about that drink, over there?", Megoosa inquired, pointing her finger to a stand where pink liquid was being poured into cups and served.

"Oh, that must be falooda. It's a real treat, I tell you, sweetness incarnate. If we got a hold of some rooh hafza and milk, I could make it for you guys. It's a summer drink, really. You have no idea how satisfying it is to drink that stuff after you break your fast. I used to down that stuff every day, for thirty days. I tell you, it's kind of tough, no food or drink from sunup to sundown is a bit of a slight, but you eventually get used to it. Besides, it's like the perfect weight loss routine!", I replied with a smile

"T…. THIRTY DAYS?! The most I've fasted was for the six weeks of lent, and even then we could eat from time to time! I could never do that, not in a million years!", Slalin called, looking horrified as to how I could survive what seemed like an insurmountable task to her.

"I say it's good training. One mustn't be a glutton. Besides, if he could do it, you most definitely are capable of it. Besides, don't tell me you've forgotten the time you accidently broke your fast by drinking in the middle of a royal procession?", Megoosa stated calmly, though with the clear intention of stirring rabble up.

"Look, you accidently broke it too! Don't excuse yourself out of this! Besides, that was only one time!", Slalin defensively countered.

I couldn't help but snicker at this, this conversation was almost too relatable, "Oh trust me, I've had my share of accidental fast breaking myself."

However, as we trudged forward, and eventually got to the front of the line, I noticed a peculiar object sitting next to the area where the multi was being distributed, a paper with what looked like a Hindu hymn inscribed, and atop it, a picture of one of their rakshankas, they use demons to drive other demons away, which I don't get that, but I guess it's a fight fire with fire instance. After all, they say a baby demon is stronger than a human wrestler, imagine one in the peak of their prime! Although, I don't think that's a great excuse to try to pry into the other side, nothing good ever comes out of that. However, the strange part was that the hymn when one read its English translation at the bottom, it read as a prayer against the demons of the underworld. That might not seem weird, but it was strange in that the demon invasion of king Piccolo had happened nearly a few decades ago. Come to think of it, I'd seen that same hymn in other buildings in the area. There was no need for such prayers at such a time, I hadn't heard stories of possession in the area either. However, if there is one flaw we Indians are good at, its holding grudges. Just take a look at Jammun and Kashmir for crying out loud, they've been running around those areas like crazies for nearly half a century now.

The shopkeeper, however, had noticed my staring at the hymn by now, and had begun to question me a little, " **apku malum consa rakshanka hamku bhagalia tha hamare gharo se?** " (Do you know of the demon that drove us from our homes?)

I decided to reply, after all, pretending to be stupid would only hold the line, " **Uska nam Piccolo tha, ha?** " (His name was Piccolo, yes?)

The shopkeeper looked a little shocked though he quickly called himself and gave us our kulfis, though not before giving me a final passing remark, one quiet enough for only me to here.

" **Accha he thorasa bache aaj ke ku malum he aur thorasa akhal he**.", (Its good some kids of today know it and have some common sense.)

0o0o0o0o0o

While all of this was occurring Tien was busy playing watchman.

"Chiatzou, did you see anything?", he called, as the familiar jiang shi floated toward his friend

"Sorry Tien, but it's like they've disappeared.", Chiatzou replied

"Oh, that can't be right. Come on now, they have to be somewhere! Those poor kids, I wonder where they are now….", Launch wondered, her soft side showing itself.

At the time, they had been busy eating, although it had taken some time to find a place where they wouldn't be hounded upon. The neighborhood, once they had seen his third eye, had tried to hound him into what looked like a temple, despite Chiatzou repeatedly intervening and telling them that Tien wasn't a holy figure. It had taken some time for them to let up, but they still kept on staring at them. The irony that he, once a cold killer could be taken for something sacred didn't go unnoticed by him.

Which is what left them now at a small cafe in the neighborhood shopping area, as they sat down to take a quick break. As they each sat down to snack on their food, they began to catch up on what they had found.

"What I don't understand is why this kid is running from us. If he knows us, shouldn't he also realize that we would not hurt him?", Tien questioned, hoping to get some ideas flowing.

"I don't know Tien, it didn't seem like that.", Launch responded

"What do you mean, Launch?", Tien asked, waiting for her thoughts.

"Well… you said that they knew us. Maybe they think they would be putting us in trouble by meeting us?"

Tien thought of this idea, but dismissed it quickly, "It's possible but highly unlikely. If they truly know us, they would know of our strength.". To be fair, he still was convinced were nothing more than imposters who had read a little too much, and had posed as seers. They probably were nothing short of delusional.

By this time, Chiatzou had finished eating his food and inveighed his opinion on the matter, "It's not that they do not know of our strength, it's that they don't want us to follow them. It's simple, they have to go somewhere, and by getting our attention, we are the "obstacles", in their way. That's why they're avoiding us.",

Launch furrowed her brows deep in thought at this, analyzing this new information, "I suppose that could be true. But if that's the case, shouldn't we be going?"

However, Tien shook his head, "There is no need for that. They have come to us. Look.", as he tilted his head in the direction of the glass outside. As Launch and Chiatzou watched, three kids were coming to the doorstep of the shop they currently were sitting in, laughing and cajolery afoot.

Chiatzou, however, looked worriedly at Tien, his eyes betraying the tempest of conscience swimming inside, "Tien… we won't need to fight them, will we? They're just kids."

"For their sake, as well as ours, I hope we don't."

0o0o0o0o0o0o

As we meandered our way through the streets, it was more like our stomachs were dragging our legs about, rather than the other way around.

"GODDESS ABOVE, I'M STARVING! Anybody know a good place for food?", Slalin called, her belly grumbling in discontent.

Looking about, and finding a small cafe known by the name Ameens, I decided to point my finger there.

"Hmm… Indo-Chinese… what exactly is that supposed to be?", Megoosa asked, genuinely curious. After all, the world of dragon quest 4 didn't have a place equivalent to china.

"Its a fusion of Chinese and Indian food. Trust me, it's really good! I've had it for years, but it's kinda hot, so tell Slalin to ask for it mild.", I instructed. The last thing I needed was to have a pyromaniac mage flinging fireballs because she burnt her tongue off.

"I'll keep that in mind. Slalin, over here! Zain has found us some sustenance!", Megoosa called to Slalin, who had wandered off a little to peer at some Hindu god statuary being sold at a store.

"Coming, Coming! Hey Zain, when I was at that store, there was a pretty statue of a woman with four arms with a flower and a really scary blue woman with a bunch of swords. Who were they?" she asked curiously

"Oh, you must be talking about Lakshmi and Kali. Lakshmi is the Hindu god of fortune, while Kali symbolizes love and death, being the goddess for both.", I explained to her, as her eyes widened a little at that last part

"WAIT, LOVE? I can understand death, but… she doesn't look like a wedding person…", Slalin furrowed her brows, trying to reason.

"Jeez, you sound just like Passeporte…", I stated. The resemblance was uncanny, in more ways than one. Like Frog and him, we'd been given a short time to do something incredibly tough, saving a kingdom for us, and crossing the world in eighty days for them. She was kind of like my sidekick, or was I her sidekick? Either way, we, just like those two, have gotten embroiled into some crazy things! I just hope Slalin doesn't get drunk on opium or alcohol when we get to this world's version of china because that would mean I'm jinxing her now.

Anyways, we opened the door, and into the store, we poured in. It was actually pretty packed, fitting for such a festive day, they probably had lowered prices. We shuffled over to the counter, as a rather tired young guju was taking orders. You could tell where he was by his name tag, these days, the last name Patel makes you a sore thumb among Indians who know their world origin.

" **apku kya hona he aaj**?", (what would you want today?), he spoke, in a drowsy tone, clearly fed up by all the buzz around him.

Taking a look at the menu, I beckoned for the other two, eyeing them to make their choices.

"May I request for the chicken hakka noodle combo please?", Megoosa queried in, as the man wrote down the food item.

With this, Slalin stood up, and began surveying, though not before Megoosa interjected,"Slalin, I would advise you to partake of the mild spice dishes. We do not need a repeat of the curry incident."

Blushing a little at that memory, which involved Slalin literally exhaling fire over the stuff, she made her Order, "Some mild chicken Manchurian rice combo, please.",

Writing that down, he cocked his head towards me, awaiting my words.

I, however, was in a mood of conformity, and so, picked what sounded best out of Slalin's and Megoosa's orders, " **Meku Chicken Manchurian or chaval ki combo hona**.", (I'd like a chicken Manchurian rice combo)

The man wrote everything down and whisked himself away to deliver the message to the kitchen, where I could hear the incessant clanging of pots and pans. The restaurant had a slightly Asiatic look to it, accentuated by green and red hues, complete with some Chinese sculpture. The tables were actually pretty posh, the kind where the seat is fused onto the wall in a circle, and the table lies in front. Taking our seats, we eagerly waited for our food, sipping water and losing ourselves in simple conversation to distract ourselves.

"So, where to go next?", Slalin mused as she rested her head in her hand.

"Well, Yamcha's down for the count, along with Bulma and chi-chi, so we've managed to get some trouble out of the way. But that still leaves Tien, who I'm sure is waltzing about with Chiatzou and Launch right now, Vegeta is probably on his lonesome, Trunks and Gotten are probably goofing off, Piccolo is probably alone too, and Roshi, Baba, Oolong, and Puar are still here too, not to mention Krillin and 18."

Megoosa sighed in utter exhaustion, "Then that means we still have more than half the group after us. Wonderful."

Slalin, however, tried to placate her sister by holding her hands up, "Come on sis, look at the bright side of things! They're busy running about in groups, so if we can cause trouble for one of them, we can slow an entire group down!",. She spoke excitedly, with a smile on her face. But she still kept her voice down, we don't want to be found out after all.

Joining the bandwagon, I nodded my head in agreement, "She's right, you know.", lowering my voice, I whispered to the both of them, "Besides, I spy with my little eye, a trio with a psychic scry."

And with that, I revealed my plan. Ya Allah, I hope this works, because I'm fresh out of ideas!

0o0o0o0o0o

Tien and the others, on the other hand, were busy keeping a watchful eye on their prey, making sure it didn't slip through their fingers.

Unfortunately for them, it seemed that the prey had spotted the predator early.

"Tien, he knows we're here. What now?", Chiatzou whispered, worriedly

"What were not going to do is make a move and blow our cover, stay here. You too, Launch.", Tien ordered

Launch nodded her assent, though not before whispering, "Tien… I get the feeling those kids are trying to plan something. Look at them now, they're whispering."

Tien looked back, and indeed, they were. Tien smirked at this, their attempt to be covert. Endearing, yet futile. Call it a relic from his assassin days, but he relished in the feeling of finding and apprehending one's targets.

 _It seems you forgot something really important in that plan of yours,_ he thought, as he squinted his third eye.

 _And it will cost you dearly._

0o0o0o0o

Looking back at Tien, I realized our cover had been blown. Again. I whispered the plan to Slalin and Megoosa, careful not to betray my intentions by accidently raising my voice or my thoughts. You see, Tien is a user of telepathy, and thus, looking at us with a squinted eye meant something a little different than when the same action was done by a normal person. Tiens third eye can actually read minds, a pretty scary power if I say so myself. So I did the only thing I knew how to do to combat this.

BS my thoughts.

Quite literally, I was thinking any kind of mental craziness that I could cook up, without veering into classified territory. Contrary to what you may think, I had planned this improvisation of my thoughts along with Slalin and Megoosa.

I know, improvising something that you know is standardized by your mind's workings to make a plan work. Ironic, huh? Well, maybe not you, but hey, to each their own.

We had actually gone over this back when we had downed Yamcha as a precaution. Slalin had chosen to think about chocolate covered prunes, which wasn't a surprise to me, those were a very big delicacy in Eastern Europe. Megoosa was busy on the other hand, thinking about target practice. We buried our plans into the deepest recesses of our minds, wrapping them beneath layers of our past, random thoughts, and personal cravings, as I whispered my plans to the two of them. Honestly, I really hope they had written the books in our favor, because if they weren't and Tien managed to pull a Satori, we were all screwed.

0o0o0o0o

Launch looked at Tien, her face in a frown, before turning to Chiaotzu.

"Are you okay Launch? You've been staring at Tien for a while now...", Chiaotzu said

"No, it's not that… it's just, I feel like something's wrong. Tien has been staring at those kids for a while now. It's not supposed to take this long. Remember that time with those bandits?"

Chiatzou thought back to that time, and it all made sense. The last time Tien did this, some robbers had broken into their house. Luckily, blonde launch had been up at the time, and she had quickly gagged them with rope and some gun shooting. After she dragged them to Tien, they vehemently denied any ill will. In a matter of seconds, Tien had merely squinted at them and had divulged their true intentions, making them surrender within mere minutes.

Now, however, he had been staring at those kids for an agonizing five minutes, and from the looks of it, hadn't gleaned a thing at all. And from Tien's perspective, nothing was truer than that. Every time he went into their head and managed to pry one mental door open, two more came out of nowhere and slammed shut in his face.

"You're right. Those kids know what Tien's doing. I should have figured as much. If they had managed to take down Yamcha, they couldn't have been so stupid.", Chiatzou spoke, slightly reprimanding himself of his carelessness.

"Oh dear, that just makes things worse. Should we go after them directly? Sitting around here isn't going to get us anywhere, after all.", Launch chirped out though visibly concerned

However, by this point, Tien had finished his mind readings and had turned to the rest of his group, having overheard the conversation, "Yes, but not now. We can't risk making a scene, and get delayed by the authorities."

Launch, however, furrowed her brow at that, "Well, can't you just make me sneeze and let her out. I'm sure she'd love to help!"

Tien, however, furrowed his brow at this, "Launch, There's no need to get in trouble because of her. It's not worth it. We just need to catch them."

However, Tien was oblivious to Launch's offended and hurt look when he said this. She wasn't extremely offended mind you, but it felt wrong to have Tien think that the blonde her was a liability, even if that meant convenience. Her blonde side had been "dead" for quite a while now, and hadn't had any contact with anybody she knew. Anytime she came back Tien or any of her friends made her sneeze her out. However, she pushed those thoughts away to focus on the issue at hand, yet they still lurked in her head.

 _As much as I love Tien and everybody else, sometimes I think they just want me around, not her. It's not fair to either of us, she is me, after all_ , she thought morbidly, though her thoughts broke when Tien signaled with a nod of his head that it was time to go, having seen the kids laugh themselves out of the restaurant.

Trying to put on a mask of approval to cover up the hurt, Launch beamed a smile, "I guess we'll do just that then! Come on then, we have to hurry!"

However, Chiatzou managed to make them both sit down thanks to some psychic meddling of his own, "Oh no you don't, Tien, don't forget to pay the bill! I get that this is important, but we can't go breaking the law!"

Sighing, Tien took some zeni out of his pocket and gave it to the man in charge of billing, as the three hastily walked away. One was filled with impatience, the other with a slight sorrow, and the third with curiosity, as they dove into the seething city streets.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Alright then, let's keep going! Slalin, did ya give Nimbus some leftovers?", I called back to her, having given her feeding duty. After all, we couldn't just take a magic cloud into a restaurant.

"I'm on it! The poor guy accidently slurped up the sauce too quick, and I think he got a chili rind! Megoosa, how's everything looking?"

Turning back, Megoosa gave us her report, "The three are still in eyes view, but they're far enough so that we can maintain our cov…", but stopped when she whirled her head to look into an alley.

Sensing the sudden pause, Slalin, and the Nimbus both looked at her, the latter having downed his curry meal with some water, "Whats wrong sis, something there? Cat got your tongue, eh?"

She signaled with a wave of her fingers, and the three of us melted away into the alley, unbeknownst to the fact that our predators had gotten the upper hand on us.

0o0o0o0o0o

"Tien, they went over there!", Chiatzou called, pointing at an alleyway

"Good work Chiatzou. Come on, we can't waste any more time.", Tien responded, a little astonished at how those kids blatantly disregarded their own cover and just fumbled into an area where they could be ambushed.

"Tien… is it just me, or do you hear that…?", Launch questioned from behind, cocking her ear to what sounded like a bunch of garbled sentences.

Tien, realizing this precious opportunity to discover intel on their targets, signaled with his hands to lay low, close enough to the alley to eavesdrop, but not close enough to actually be noticed. However, the traffic near the area had fractured the conversation into a few keywords, the rest lost to the incessant noises of the city.

"...look really hungry!"

"...Have some!"

"Thank you….."

"...CAN TALK?!"

"...very assuming"

"...not my fault!"

",...Going places?"

"...Come with us!"

"...Have to get home, why not?"

Tien looked ahead, as did Launch with Chiatzou taking a look for curiosity's sake. The kids were talking to a chest…. a _talking, breathing chest_.

"I've heard stories of objects being controlled by supernatural forces, but this is just ridiculous!", Chiatzou called balking at the scene, but quietly.

"Oh my, that chest has some sharp teeth! Look at its tongue!", Launch peeped out, sizing up the new anomaly. Tien followed Launch's actions, curious of this newfound object, as he lay in thought.

 _First the secrets, knocking Yamcha out, and now you can communicate with inanimate objects? Just what are you?,_ Tien thought, as he began to walk toward the alley, questions running about in his head.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

In all our time here, I thought here and Korin were the only places with dimensional hoppers, and how I prayed for that not to be true. It would be awfully lonely to only have such few places to seek counsel.

Oddly enough, this must have been one of those prayers Allah took, who was probably taking pity on my state because standing in front of me was the real deal man-eating chest, a cannibox. Its eyes were closed, had they been open, however, they would've been yellow on the iris, and blue on the pupils and its mouth, where the chest lid should have merged with the bottom was shut fast, hiding the long red-pink tongue they all possess, along with razor sharp teeth. It was breathing quite faintly, and judging from the wear and tear its wood "skin" was in, hadn't eaten in a few days. I took sympathy for the poor thing, I was in that state just a few weeks ago, confused and frightened just as much. So, forgoing all sense of common sense, I tapped the cannibox lightly with my knuckles.

Alarmed, Slalin hissed in fright, "Zain, are you out of your mind?! That thing'll probably eat your arm up if it wanted too! Why the heck are you trying to wake it up?!"

Even Megoosa, who was normally not against some dangerous behavior, voiced her uneasiness, "Zain, I urge you to proceed with caution. Canniboxes are very fierce creatures, having access to the whack, frizz, and sap lines, not to mention that their luck is absurdly high."

I waved these thoughts aside, though, and spoke to them, honest and true, "Honestly, the nerve of you two! This guy is busy starving, and you want to just ditch him? I thought you guys were better than that. Now I don't care if he winds up devouring my arm, I'm gonna give him some food, consequences be damned!". Who could deny such a person in need of charity, and one so sincere in his plight too? I've dealt with my own share of beggar impersonators, India and America have buttloads of them, but I try to look at things more realistically. After all, one doesn't simply beg, it's rather demeaning to one's self-esteem, and to summarize it in an old saying, is like dragging your face on the floor until you wind up getting the slenderman treatment. To paraphrase Nick Carraway, "Never criticize someone's actions, because you don't know what they're going through."

Stunned a little at this outburst of mine, the two left me to my own devices, as I gently prodded the cannibox into waking up. Soon enough, groans began to emanate out of the box, and its eyelids opened up. The thing looked at us in a bit of a dazed state, before its eyes widened, and it began to panic, looking about anxiously.

"Easy there, boxer, what train do you need to catch? For starters, you need to eat something, because you sure as heck aren't going anywhere like this.", I stated, eying him, while offering him a plate of leftover Chinese food. I would've expected it to just take it and snarf it down because that's what I would've done, and say it's thanks later. Instead, this one decided to talk.

"How do you know my name?", it inquired, it's voice hollow and possessing and echoing tone, fitting for a sound emanating from a chest that holds many secrets, expansive in depth and trickery.

"Your name, wait, your name is Boxer?", I stated, arching a brow in skepticism. I was simply making a pun joke there with boxes, I never thought I would hit a bulls-eye with that one, to be frank with you.

"Indeed. Anyway, I'm quite famished. Might you let me eat your food?", it asked again, in a rather refined manner, a far departure from what I had expected.

"Sure, you look dreadfully hungry. It wouldn't be right to let you starve away like this. Want anything to go with it, I have some soy sauce and spice mix packets. Slalin, can you fish those out?", I called, as she began fumbling and the cannibox, now known as Boxer, began eating.

From what I had thought, these guys would be like jinn in their inclination of trickery and mischief. Instead, I've got a gentlemanly chest eating food in front of me, praying to the goddess before digging in too, the whole nine yards. It also seemed to have proper table etiquette too, well, proper enough for one without hands and legs, and only a mouth.

"Hey boxer, just a question, monster to monster, where did you come from anyway? You got the parasol treatment, didn't ya?", Slalin butted in, as Boxer was busy chewing on a hari mirchi.

"You people have also gone through the same experience, as well? That is quite a relief, we thought we were the only monsters in this land!", Boxer exclaimed in joy, licking his plate, as I lay astonished at how fast he had eaten, seriously, the guy had managed to lick every trace of masala off of the damn thing.

"Far from it, my friend. We've journeyed from a land in the north to garner allies in a quest to save our newfound home here, under attack from a civil war. The boy that offered you food is another case entirely, but he has been with us for a while, having actually been the one to find the princess, my sister, actually.", Megoosa lectured, pointing at both me and Slalin all the while.

"Oh, so you're royalty too? I guess we've got to stick together then, as fellow royalty at the least.", Boxer smirked, as he hopped towards us, looking at Slalin

"Oh please, I really don't prefer the title anyway. Just a bunch of words that stop you from doing what you want, in my opinion. Just call me Slalin. Anyway, you said that you've got a place to say, right? We'll ferry you back there if you want.", she motioned, this time towards the Nimbus, who had been playing lookout earlier, but was now raining buckets, and turning an interesting shade of light blue.

Looking at the new display, I peeped out of the alley, only to bump headfirst into a person. Boy, did that hurt, because whoever it was must have had a head made out of concrete!

"Ouch…. Jeez, watch where you're going, will ya?", I snapped before my blood immediately chilled at the sight of the one… no, three people stand in front of me.

"Ya Allah, ab kiu?". ( Oh Allah, why now?), I moaned, as I looked at the now smirking former Crane students, Launch right behind them.

Before they could respond to me, though, I decided to pull an Eid al-Adha and be sheep for the slaughter, "GUYS, THEY'RE HERE! GET READY!". Honestly, so much for my plan, because these guys just had to catch us at the worst time!

0o0o0o0o0o00o

Tien sized up the kids, taking a nice, long look with all three of his eyes. They seemed normal, but nothing unnatural. However, their weapon choice was a bit… eccentric. The boy seemed to have a frying pan tucked away as a weapon, the girl had a long staff of iron, most likely scavenged, and the other girl had managed to acquire boomerangs of all things. As for the….. Chest, it seemed to be absolutely unarmed. With a scowl, Tien began to speak, disappointment laced in his voice

"Serves you right kid, did you really think you could pick a bone with us and just up and leave?", Tien stated, with that same small scowl on his face.

"Honestly, first it was scarface, and now we've got clown kid and three eyes?", Slalin forward in exhaustion

"I usually don't fall to such odd vernacular, but for once, sister, you're absolutely correct. Also, you also forgot the Jekyll and hyde sneezing woman", Megoosa responded in turn, pointing at Launch.

"Hey, I am not a kid! Just because I'm tiny doesn't mean I actually am tiny!", Chiatzou replied offended

Boxer, on the other hand, had already slipped into what seemed like a combat stance, well, more like a squishy chest stance, "So, I"m taking it these guys are chasing after you due to your alien status."

Slalin on the other hand, rolled her eyes, and Nimbus looked absolutely annoyed at him, puffing up to obscene levels, "Grate job Sherlock, why don't you tell us that you figured out that the sun rises in the east or something?"

"Oh come on Slalin, give the poor guy a break! It's not like he knows who these people are anyway!", I angrily snapped back. Honestly, that sharp tongue of hers was going to be the death of me one of these days!

"Look now, there's no need for anybody to get hurt. You just need to come with us.", Chiatzou stated, raising his hands in a placating gesture.

Launch nodded her assent at this, voicing a sympathetic comment, "I understand you must be off on some grand adventure, but we really do need to know about you people. How do we know that you all aren't going to cause trouble?"

I was actually going to respond to that, considering how fair-minded blue Launch is, and kind of spill the beans. However, Tien had decided to speak up.

" Look, you and me don't have all day to waste here, and that "quest" of yours certainly isn't going to help. Now come with us, so that you can go home afterward after we sort this out.", he said, in a rather annoyed voice. _Jeez…. Someone's on their period…., I thought to myself. Then again, we had technically busted a party he was probably relaxing at, and considering his work on the farm, I can understand why he's so cranky._ But then it clicked in my head, _crap when we were at the restaurant, I must have used our quest details as a mental door blockade!_ _ **Crapcrapcrap**_ _this is not good_.

At this, Slalin was visibly fuming, Boxer and I both looked with displeasure at such a rude comment, but Megoosa simply stared at him icily, moreso than usual. Seriously, if looks could kill, she probably would've turned Tien into a puddle of bloody mush. Even launch and Chiaotzu were giving him disapproving stares, but his rant had kept him oblivious from them.

"You think is all a game don't you….", she replied slowly, her anger slowly leaking through the words, as she gripped her boomerangs tightly, hard enough that I thought I saw some rivulets of blood come out of her hands, her knuckles white.

"If you really knew us, you would have known that we could have handled whatever issue you have. The fact that you didn't do this proves that you all are nothing more than frauds.", Tien retorted, oblivious to Megoosa's rising anger. However, he hadn't factored something important in. When he had scanned our thoughts, we had locked away whatever data we had on him and any of his companions, leaking out only the word "quest" from time to time, I'm guessing, due to my own negligence, the rest following our pre-planned scenarios. It was no wonder that he thought of us as fakes, thought the insult was still rather annoying.

Seeing her sister combusting internally in rage, she tried to pacify her, through words and even through physical restraint, but all was in vain. Megoosa crept out of Slalin's arm lock and walked toward Tien, as her boomerang began to glow a pale white-blue light.

"MY FATHER IS POSSESSED YOU POMPOUS FOOL! MY HOMELAND IS IN RUINS, AND YOU HAVE THE GALL… THE AUDACITY TO THINK ITS "NOT A BIG DEAL"? MY SISTER NEARLY DIED HERE AND YOU THINK YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO MAKE FUN OF THAT? MY FRIEND OVER THERE HAS BEEN WORKING LEFT AND RIGHT TO TRY TO FIND A WAY HOME FOR US AND ALL YOU PEOPLE SEEM TO BE ABLE TO DO IS SIT ON YOUR ASS BECAUSE SOME ALIEN OVERLORD HASN'T COME AND DUMPED CRAP ON THIS PLANET. CLEARLY ALL THAT POWER HAS GONE TO YOUR HEAD. DEFENDERS OF THE PLANET, MY ASS..", she finished, finally smoothing herself out.

Tien looked a little taken aback at that and rather offended, "Watch it, girl, you know nothing."

But Megoosa began to cackle insanely, "Nothing. You think I know nothing? I'd watch your mouth if I were you, crane bastard."

Tien and Chiatzou both looked a little wide-eyed at that name, one they probably hadn't heard of in decades, "That's right, I am not some idiot who just read up about you, and neither are they.", Megoosa stated proudly, pointing her finger at me and Slalin.

Launch tried to intervene, in a futile attempt to defuse the situation, "Now now I'm sure we can all….", but was immediately silenced by Megoosa's rant, which was now approaching bullet train speed.

"Forgive me Launch, you seem like a rather kind individual. Chiatzou over there seems like one as well. Tien, on the other hand, needs a little bit of…. reprimanding.", Megoosa stated, then swerved her focus back to Tien

"If we really were fakes, why would we know about your assassins career, and your apprenticeship to Mercenary Tao and the Crane hermit Master Shen, not to mention your conning business with InoShikoCho? If we were fakes, why would we know about the fact that you broke Yamcha's leg all those years ago at the Tenkaichi Budokai before King Piccolo made his mark out of sheer spite of his origins in martial arts, after all, does the crane not eat the turtle? If we were fakes, why would we know that you faced Drum and his sire? Why would we know that Chiatzou blew himself to stop Nappa, or that you died from an excess use of the tri-beam and a severed arm in that battle, or your training with King Kai, your stalling of Cell and slight fight with Majin Buu? Well, do we seem like fakes now?", Megoosa stated, eyes full of hate.

"...", Tien was basically left speechless at this point. _There's no way…. Nobody should know something as private as that…. Yet these kids have been witness to my entire life! They really are telling the truth, down to the letter! Whatever the boy thought is actually very much fact then!_ , Tien thought alarmed, realizing at the blunder he had made. He had gambled that by psychologically intimidating and toying with their emotions, he would make them submit. Unfortunately, they had all managed to pull a Goku, and even the boy, who would have been the first for reconciliation, looked absolutely livid, not a good sign if you knew what was what.

"So, have you stopped spewing garbage, dumbass? I swear you're worse than the old scarface geezer! At least, he had common sense where it was due, and according to Zain he was the weakest out of all of you! Is there some sort of correlation between lack of intelligence and strength in this dimension?", Slalin fumed out, looking at me for a split second.

"Alright I get it, you were right. Now come with us already, you've wasted enough of my time as is.", Tien ordered, nay, demanded, as he turned his back from them, anticipating the. He was sick of the stalling that these kids had managed to pull.

"...No"

"Excuse me?", Tien questioned, turning his back, to find that the boy, Zain, had finally spoken.

"You see, we need to go places, and you're in the way, as you've suspected. It's high time that we…. blow you all away.", he called, and Tien suddenly noticed that the talking chest had suddenly made an appearance, having begun to open his mouth, a pink hue beginning to form inside. _That thing must have been charging an attack while the boy stalled us!,_ Tien thought, cursing his folly, as he jumped backward, flinging a ki blast, while Chiatzou grabbed Launch and did the same, in a vain effort to dodge the attack. However, Zain cried out, and three sheets of thick ice met the blast, and it quickly dissipated, though not before flinging through two of the sheets and nearly cracking the third one while the chest hopped over the makeshift shield after it outlived its use, blast still a' charging. The last things they saw were Zain's smirking face, a grinning treasure chest, and a haze of sweet pink mist.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Finally, those assholes decided to SHUT UP. Thank the goddess for canniboxes and their sweet breath!", Slalin cried in relief, as she pointed at the now splayed, snoring bodies of our would-be captors.

"Indeed, your tactic was a great one. Although you really must work on your humor Zain, that pun was horrendous.", Megoosa frowned in mock disapproval.

"OH COME ON! I AIN'T THE SCHEZERADE OF JOKES ALRIGHT? Boxer, at least, tell me you liked my little show of flair.", I fumed visibly, tapping my foot impatiently, as I said the last sentence in mock desperation. Although, I was actually quite surprised by how well the ice held against Tien's attack. I had expected it to fly through all three sheets and hit Boxer point blank, and it actually managed to hold the blast, well... barely hold the blast, but that still is better than nothing! It seemed like mana was a more concentrated form of energy than Ki, probably stemming from the same source of course, and could handle energy attacks better.

The cannibox began to smirk in a rather interesting fashion, revealing some fangs, before speaking, "I'm sorry Zain, but that really was horrible. I've seen cheeky tikis come up with better."

As I sat down there with my now ruined pride in my comedic skills, we began to wander once more, shifting left and right, as Boxer had spontaneously gijinkafied himself. He now was clad in a brown trench coat and wore a long red scarf, wrapped around his neck. Of average height, if a little on the short side, a little taller than me, (who could blame him, chests aren't supposed to be tall anyway), he actually could pass for human if it weren't for his eyes or his razor sharp teeth. Honestly, I don't know how these people manage to let that happen to themselves. To quote a certain shrine maiden, or maybe a certain book-nabbing magician, "You can't have common sense here".

Although, that didn't stop me from asking, "Boxer, can you control your form shifts?"

"Why yes, it's doable. We canniboxes are masters of deception, so such changes of shapes are no impossible feat. When we get to my home, I could show you all how to learn the technique."

I heard a visible sigh of relief, along with some excited chatter from Slalin and surprisingly Megoosa, probably in relief of getting their old bodies back, as I pondered these new factors. Such a technique could be used to full fruition, and considering our lack of ki, it could be the perfect disguise tool.

We continued to shift and coil until we managed to reach the shop that I wanted to get too, a paint shop famous for holi color bomb capsules. Thank goodness we actually managed to get to the goddamned place, we had wound up losing our way twice and had nearly boarded a subway to the other side of town!

"Wait, what are we doing here, Zain?", Boxer stated, voicing everyone's big question

I could only giggle evilly, and rub my hands in anticipation, an evil grin topping the look, "You'll see Boxer, you'll see."

" **Holi ki masti, arey holi ki masti, ye wale ku bhagho!** ", (Holi's fun, oh holi's fun, drive those people away!), I sang, as the sun rode it's chariot to the center of the sky, near its usual position at midday, as the people ran through the streets like animals in a thicket, and as powerful forces stalked for us high and low.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

Tien was a man that was almost a master of finding out a person and using said information to his advantage, for his past years as an assassin had basically gifted him that trait.

So to see someone actually take his power, and _flip the tables on him,_ was rather…. Aggravating.

"I can't believe we lost them! Tien, do you have any idea where they could have gone?", Chiatzou inquiried, to have Tien only shakes his head in defeat. They had lost them, and there was no way they'd be able to find them quickly enough. But, it didn't hurt to try, now did it?

"No, but now is not the time to mope. We must hurry, or we will only increase the odds to their benefit.", Tien stated coldly. They both began to sit still and plot their next move, but fate is never that easy.

A-AAACHOO!

Turning their back to Launch, they were shocked to find a face they hadn't seen in years.

"Oi, Tien, ya big lug! The hell are you just standing there for? Where the hell are we?!", she replied, whirling her gun out of nowhere.

Tien could only sigh, yet also, chuckle at this display of flair, looking up at the sky.

It was going to be a long day, yet somehow, it felt great to be needed by the world again, even if it meant tackling something as mundane as runaway magic children.


	10. Chapter 10: Subterranean Animism

**Author's note: Hey everybody! I'm not actually dead! Sorry, but finals and A.P exams tend to knock the life out of you when it comes to this. Add to the fact that I wound up on a binge on another fandom, and well... you get the idea. But anyway, let's get going (COUGH SHAMELESS TITLE REFERENCES COUGH)**

 **Cleithrophobia- Fear of being trapped**

"Ooh, why don't we get that one!"

"Slalin, it doesn't matter if we bomb them with turquoise or black, pick something!", Boxer called, though he was lying right to our faces. He was busy sampling color bomb capsules too.

"Boxer, we all have knowledge that you are deceiving us, or at least, attempting too. You must have some personal preference. I say we go for sky blue and dark gray. Such a combination would be an unholy terror upon their eyes.", Megoosa replied devilishly

Boxer grumbled a little at this, annoyed that his ruse had been found out, "Well, I say we go for primary and secondary colors. We can't make ourselves too flashy."

Slalin quirked an eyebrow at that, "Huh…. Never took you for an artist….", she spoke

Boxer snapped at that, "Just because we have sharp teeth and long tongues doesn't make us idiots!", while Slalin was now apologizing profusely.

Meanwhile, I had picked up on Megoosa's rather… torturous artistic inclinations, "Jeez, Megoosa, we're trying to buy stuff we can throw as a red herring, not inquisition era torture devices from an eye doctor! Although, now that you mention it, a contrast like that would make their eyes go nuts for a bit. I'm more of a light blue-green and blue person myself. What about you Nimbus?", I called back.

The Nimbus, as usual, puffed itself up, and using a cloudy tendril, pointed at itself.

We all glared and scowled at this display of vanity, though we each slipped a capsule the color of his cloudiness into our bags.

Meanwhile, the shopkeeper had a smile that probably could've gone from sea to shining sea. Apparently, he hadn't gotten this much business in a long time. While I did feel annoyed we were spending a lot, I felt happy that this man would be able to make a living from our spending.

 **Aree, apku kitna pesa he? Ap tho meri puri duckhan cu lesekte!** ", (How much money do you have! You could take my whole shop!)

I responded in kind, with a smile on my face, " **Aree, apku pesa hona he! Liou or ap zindage me ache resakte!)** (Oh, you just need money! Take some and live your life well!)

The shopkeeper responded in kind and smiled, though not before asking us with yet another odd stare, " **Aaj tho Ganesha Chaturthi he, apku kiu Holi ki rang hona he?** ", (Today is Ganesha Chaturthi, why do you need Holi's colors?)

Smiling at this, I responded, " **Thorisi masti or shararath ke lie he, cuch aur ke lie nahi. Me to musalman hu, me holi nai karta.** ", (They're for some fun and mischief, nothing more. I'm Muslim after all, I don't celebrate holi.)

By this point, everyone had decided to cast their glances my way, even Nimbus, who were looking at me with confused stares, "Wait... what were you talking about?", they all said, looking at me like I had morphed into some eldritch abomination.

I sighed at this, for acting the part of a translator can get rather tedious, "Oh nothing, just a quick talk on why we're buying all this stuff."

Taking that, they all began to finish their shopping and lined up for purchase. Each taking a bag of holi capsules, which now looked like engorged sacks, they dumped them on the counter.

With stars in his eyes over such good business, the man smiled, "5000 zeni, **tik he**?", (5000 zeni, okay?)

I grimaced a little at that amount, realizing that everyone had pulled a Costco and had bought in bulk, but I fished the money out of my pocket regardless.

Smiling at us, he wished us a good day, and we began to leave, though I wavered at the door for a while, before I spoke my mind.

" **Ap ku tho ek tip hona, nai? Lio**." (You need a tip, no? Take it.). With that, I flung a gold coin his way, which he managed to catch amidst some fumbling. Seeing the coin made his eyes widen like saucers, I'm sure, but by then, I was already gone, like a wisp of noise on the wind.

0o0o0o0o

Tien and Chiaotzu were still looking about, blonde launch rummaging about. They had explained the situation to her, and so, she set about, determined to please Tien at all costs. Which brought them to where they were now, her having cocked a gun in a shopkeeper's face, a rather familiar one, I'm sure, to you all, at least.

"THE HELL DO YOU MEAN THAT YOU HAVEN'T SEE THEM?!", Launch roared, getting angrier by the second, just a finger away from shooting bullets in the air.

The shopkeeper was sweating buckets seeing this irate blonde, and his mouth wasn't doing much better. Seeing that Launch was probably going to make the guy faint from sheer fright, Chiaotzu stepped in.

"Launch, come on, you know this isn't working! Don't tell me you're having fun by doing this?", Chiaotzu spoke, trying to calm the powder key down.

"Quiet little man! Although, you do make a damn good point there. Can't have the guy scared like a wuss, or else it'll be damn near impossible to pry his mouth open!", Launch spoke, as she slid her gun into its holster.

She tapped her foot impatiently, waiting for the man to regain his senses, "I don't have all day, old man!", she crassly snapped, making him hurriedly spill out his tale, a side effect of sheer fright.

"I'll talk! There were a bunch of teenagers here, and they were buying these capsules of mine! They left after that and paid me, happy!?", the shopkeeper screamed out in terror and frustration.

While Launch was busy processing this information, Tien noticed with a glance of his third eye, a glinting, round object on the counter. Picking it up, he was flabbergasted to realize that it was a gold coin, and not just the fake kind either. A strange insignia was crafted onto it, a smiling teardrop wearing a crown, along with a motto encircling the top portion of the coin, written in a language he had never seen.

Taking this in, he walked over to the shopkeeper, "Where did you get this?", he curtly questioned

Defensively, the shopkeeper retorted back, "That's mine! It's just an old memento!"

Seeing this act of defiance, Launch quickly lifted the poor man up, his legs dangling off the floor, "You listen here bub. Me and my friends here have been running around town looking for someone that came round here, and I'll be damned if you're the asshole that lets them get away, SO TALK, BASTARD!"

Finally having cracked the poor man's turtle shell of resistance, he babbled everything he knew, "They seemed to be in a hurry somewhere, and all they did was just bought those capsules and gave me that coin! They left the shop and turned to the right after that! PLEASE, THAT'S ALL I KNOW! DON'T KILL ME!", he cried, full-out shaking in fright

Launch immediately dropped the man after this, and he scurried to his counter, "Well damn, that doesn't help much at all! Might as well follow the way those kids took, huh Tien?"

Tien looked outside, and nodded his assent, "Might as well, we don't have any more information to find here."

Chiaotzu, on the other hand, hurriedly opened the door, "Well, come on then! We can't waste time standing here!"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Honestly, this is quite troublesome.", Boxer stated, walking against the current of people as we maneuvered our way through the streets.

"It's not that bad. You get used to it after to a while, and you can even find openings to slip through quickly, and walk faster too. It's good exercise on the legs too. After all, we royalty have to keep an image, don't we?", Slalin spoke back, smile laced onto her feature. To be quite fair, it was like her personality was, while a bit tomboyish, quite optimistic. Perhaps this is what a gender bent version of Goku would have looked like….

"You seem to equate this pedestrian activity to that of a battlefield, sister. Although, to be fair, you are not exactly off the mark. This makes for good evasion practice.", Megoosa replied, dodging a man from the left.

The nimbus, on the other hand, was floating above the crowd, gloating in the fact that it didn't have to do such common work, which humbled even future kings and queens.

"Sweet mother of god, nimbus, I get that you're a floating cloud thingy, but must you be such an ass about it?", I called looking at it with an annoyed deadpan. The thing pretended not to hear me, instead opting to continue reveling in its small victory. If it weren't for the fact that it was a cloud with a name, I would've just slapped the name Cirno on it and called it an idiot because of its obscene pompousness.

"Ignore him Zain. The posterior is much less important than the anterior.", Megoosa replied dryly, though with the implications of a joke.

Doing so, and leaving Nimbus to his fuming, we continued to walk about, roaming the streets, a set course determined, but the directions unknown.

"This friend of yours… how long have you known him?", Slalin replied to Boxer, looking forward

"About as long as I have existed. We both were born in Uptaten Towers, but I went toward Port Haven after the castle was exorcised, while he stayed near the ruins. We've fought many a good battle together, and he even managed to survive a duel against the child that would soon become the father of the legendary hero. If you're worrying about his credentials as a royal, trust me, he's got what you need.", Boxer replied, looking as if he was commemorating a great ruler of old, be it Choseros, Ceaser, or the Bilqis. Well to be frank though, Choeseros was a dick whose son Shervah killed him, Ceaser was a good ruler of the Romans for the most part while Bilqis, the Queen of Sheba, was probably the only smart ruler in the traditional theology I've studied. I mean, props to her for _not_ trying to murder King Solomon, not like she had a chance anyway, I mean, who can stop an army of jinn and killer birds, and the fact that he had control over the wind kinda makes him about as easy to beat as a full power Flandre Scarlet, unlike what some people tried to pull on Jesus, but I'm rambling here.

"Well, then what is he? Will o' wisp? A magician? Skeleton Knight? Wait those didn't live there…", I guessed aloud, only to fail dismally at each of Boxer's rejections

"Nope… think a little harder.", he smirked, baring his shark-esque fangs again

"Ooh, how about a ghost! The ones with the purple top hat!", Slalin called out of nowhere, hands flailing upward

"I suppose I would put my wager on the dead magicians. Those things can be quite annoying, especially in large groups. One alone is enough to cause immense damage.", Megoosa extended her hand, gesticulating while stating her answer.

"Wrong, wrong, and wrong. My friend, is in fact, a wax murderer. How on earth did you not figure that out?! You all practically listed every other being that lived there once!", Boxer exclaimed shocked at our stupidity.

"Well, excuse me, but not all of us do monsterology. After all, we kinda are in the middle of oh I don't know… TRYING TO GET HOME TO STOP A CIVIL WAR.", Slalin retorted sarcastically, with much bravado. From behind, Megoosa smirked dryly in approval.

"Yes, Yes, I may have fooled you all, but isn't that what canniboxes are, the epitome of trickery? Now, let us get moving. After all, time doesn't wait for anybody, and judging from the persistence of those fighters, neither will they. We should be reaching my friend's residence in another five minutes.", Cannibox smiled, but with a serious undercurrent running under the expression.

Hoisting my frying pan back onto my back, having been strapped by a rope of thick cloth, I nodded my head, "Let's go guys. There's no time to waste.", as we began to walk ever faster to our destination.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Damn it! Just how damn long haven't I been around for?! Goku's got kids and Bulma got married and had kids too?! Piccolo ain't evil anymore?! Krillin married a robot and had a baby girl?! Tien, what the hell?!", Launch angrily called, upset over her displacement.

"Look, you just didn't come around for those years. Also, 18 is an android", Tien called, trying to paddle his way out of the situation.

"That's a load of bull and you know it, Tien. Also, tomato tamato, she's still a metal woman.", Launch replied, her tone now going somewhere venomous.

Tien began to try to back off, seeing the simmering rage in her eyes, "Well... you were technically on the run looking for me during those years..."

"So you couldn't just drag my ass back to your house or something? Let's see how everybody else reacts when they see me. I've got some nice words to tell them. I don't even give a damn if these bullets can't kill them, they just better hurt, because I know damn well Goku can deal with these, I raised the damn kid! I'm not leaving you guys, but after I'm through with them, you and I are going to have a nice long talk.", she said, cocking her gun threateningly.

Tien almost blanched at the thought, looking on in horror. If Launch even met Vegeta like this... well it would be a miracle if Capsule Corp was left bullet-free or ki singed.

 _Kami, what have I done?,_ he thought in horror, as Launch strutted forward, ahead of him. He had screwed things up, and now, he didn't have a way to fix it.

0o0o0o0o0o

"So, we're here.", Boxer stated as we looked up at the tall, imposing building.

"Well, whoever your friends is, he certainly knows how to set the mood.", Megoosa stated as we walked into what looked like an old, gothic church. The halls were empty, a janitor lazily dusting the floors, the pulpit unattended. The thick windows let sunlight stream in, illuminating the stained glass windows, each containing a story of Jesus life, his apostles, his tribulations, and trials. But to be fair, I never understood how an apostle would betray their own spiritual leader for thirty silver coins.

"This building might be pretty, but it sure isn't a star attraction, that's for sure.", I spoke, dusting my shoes off. In these times, faith generally has taken a bit of a nosedive regarding the population. The fanatic nutjobs running around these days aren't helping either.

"Indeed. If it weren't for my friend, this building would've been left to its fate. The wax murders have made themselves a home here, and just like Uptaten, they're not keen on giving it away. Though, since nobody comes here, they don't have to deal with that.", Boxer drabbled on, before moving toward the organ piano. Playing a special tune, a loud rumbling resonated throughout the building, as Boxer then walked forward to a once hidden passage, leading down into the earth.

"Uhhh…. Is it safe to go down there right? I'm not a fan of dark tunnels. You know, the whole death thing and all.", Slalin drawled out, laughing nervously, the nimbus cowering behind her.

"I assure you it's perfectly fine. Besides, you are the princess of Galetown, or what's left of it. It would befit you to act in a more sophisticated matter.", Megoosa spoke, half lecture, half assurance.

"O….of course I'm not scared! Where did you get that from! A princess isn't scared of anything, after all, hahaha!", she laughed, but the sweat dripping off her forehead and her wavering tone betrayed her brave remark.

You know, for all of the people here, I expected Slalin to be the last person to have cleithrophobia, although to be fair, I am not looking forward to that tunnel. I can already see us getting jumped by ghosts there. Although to be fair, all people's spirits go off into the afterlife, these creatures must be jinn that got the name for playing the part too well, I mused to myself. Contrary to our age of crazy hauntings and beyond the grave rumblings, souls were quite a finite thing in my view. When you were dead, off you went to barzakh, and there you lay. This wasn't like some vacation stay, well it kinda was, but still, you were dead for crying out loud, there's no coming back from that! Although knowing my luck, my logic was probably going to be horribly off the mark when it came to that matter.

"Well, why are we just standing about here? Shouldn't we be moving? I'd rather get jumped today by ghosts then when I'm eighty and have no way of defending myself.", I spoke, foot tapping impatiently.

Boxer looked behind me and cracked a smirk, "Ah, but of course, we don't have all the time in the world after all. Come, let us hurry. My friend never liked tardiness, though he's a bit of a slacker himself.", he snickered at that last sentence, as we all descended into the tunnel, the entrance closing behind us.

"Uh…. there's no chance of the cave collapsing on us right?", Slalin asked worried sick, almost jumping ten feet in the air when the entrance shut itself fast.

"By the goddess, Slalin, silence yourself and keep moving!", Megoosa thundered, and with that, we walked along the underground tunnel to nowhere, nowhere known to man of course.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Tien was still running around with Launch and Chiatzou, and unfortunately, nothing was getting done. They had lost the kids, again. However, it had seemed like Launch's temper was beginning to wane, especially after talking with Chiatzou.

"Well… it's not like everybody forgot about you. In fact, Bulma basically dragged Goku and everybody else out to look for you after they bet the Saiyans. You should come with use to the party after all this is done, they'll have some great stories to tell you of the past few years."

" Yeah, I probably should do that. But never mind that, what the hell are you guys looking for?",

" A group of kids. They're busy running around somewhere in the city, and they've already managed to evade Bulma, Chi Chi, and the three of us. They're not alone, they're traveling with a talking chest.", Tien replied curtly.

"Considering I've already seen Krillin die and come back from the grave, I shouldn't be so surprised, but what the hell? Seriously, these kids sound like magicians or something!", Launch barked, trying to make sense of it all.

"That's because they are, Launch. They managed to throw fireballs and icicles at Yamcha, they've got a copy of Goku's Nimbus, and they're also being targeted by monsters as we speak. They're trying to get out of the city and go to Korin for some reason.", Chiatzou replied

"That place with that tall-ass tower? I never managed to climb that damn thing, I think I only got a quarter of the thing done. People there thought I was some sort of warrior for being able to do that, but damn, I really wanted to go to that old man's Lookout! Although, kicking the old man's ass into a hole probably wouldn't have helped much with that.", Launch replied , looking back in her memories.

Tien blinked a little at that, surprised at how strong Launch was. He had expected her to climb a bit of the tower, but a quarter? It wasn't the whole thing, but that was impressive enough. Sometimes he forgot humanity was still capable of pulling off miracles of strength.

"Anyway, enough standing around her like dumbasses, let's go! Hop on guys!", Launch called, as she decapsulated a motorcycle, and waved her hand, toward them, signaling them to climb on.

Tien seated himself onto her bike, as did Chiatzou,as they sped off into the city's chaos and hubbub.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"ARE WE THERE YET, PLEASE TELL ME WE ARE!", Slalin shrieked through the catacomb-like halls. Boy, oh boy had I underestimated her phobia of the underground, she had gone hysterical!

"Slalin please, calm down! There's nothing out to get you!", Megoosa cried, grabbing her in an effort to console her.

Even Boxer and I had stopped, and the Nimbus was circling around Slalin with absolutely no idea of what to do to help. To be quite fair, I'm not a psychiatrist myself, but this was insane. It looked like a borderline panic attack!

Wait, panic…..OH GOD.

"Someone clamp a hand on her mouth, she's hyperventilating!", I cried, but Megoosa looked at me like I'd grown three heads and had a bloody knife in my hands.

"Are you insane?! I'm not going to suffocate her!", she cried out loud, but after seeing her sister turning blue a little, she wisely zipped her mouth and did what I asked. Thank you, !

"Alright Slalin, breathe, BREATHE. We're all here, and there's no reason to be scared.", Megoosa soothingly spoke, stroking her head gently with her hand.

Shakily, Slalin managed to stand up, and offered a wagering smile, "Alright… I'll try to be a little bit braver now. Can't have me passing out in a cave if we get jumped by monsters.", she spoke slightly shakily, with a bit of a sheepish laugh.

 _Last time I checked, panic attacks don't go away that quickly, but what the heck._ , I thought, looking at this scene with a bit of a questioning look.

We all began to have a little old laugh over this, though the clapping of two hands interrupted us. Looking for the source of the noise, was a magenta colored candle demon, knife in hand, with a pale green flame atop his head, flanked by two white candle demons, a grin on his face, full of mischief.

"Well, if it issssnt Boxer? What a ssssuprisse! It'ssss been far too long, my friend. Oh and you've brought guesssts!", he spoke, hissing like a snake.

"Ah, Wick, good to see you! I'd love to chat, but we're on the run from some rather powerful people. Could you take us deeper inside, and seal off the entrances. I could teach you a cool trick or two so you can go into the outside world. If I know you, you're probably dying to go out and have a fun time."

"Sssometimes I wisssh you weren't my friend, you read me far too eassssily. But, I'm interessssted now, come! The day issss sssshort after all!", Wick exclaimed in excitement,as his guards motioned for us so that we could be escorted. Following him, we marched ever deeper into the underground labyrinth that was the Wax Murderers stronghold.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

Standing in front of a rather familiar church, Chiatzou concentrated, focusing his psychic abilities. Thanks to years of training, he could pick up on others presences, much like ki sensing, with the additional bonus of being able to sort the natural from the supernatural, and as for this church, well, it was SWIMMING in supernatural energy.

"Tien, you might wanna take a look at baldy over there, he's been staring all funny at that church for a heck of a lotta time.", Launch called, keeping her gun up and ready for any potential targets.

"Chiatzou, you see something?", Tien called, though not before using his Ki to see if anybody was there, but he found nothing. Whatever this was, it was of a psychic sort.

"Yeah… something's off with that church. I can sense a really deep supernatural energy coming off of the place! It's breaking up and moving too!", Chiatzou called.

More of those candle demons? I thought we'd finished off the last of them? They must've had reinforcements., Tien thought, though not before Launch shouted aloud.

"Well what the hell are we waiting for?! I've said it once and I'm damned if I say it again, MOVE IT! I came here for an adventure, and the fact that you two are standing there like with your damn heads in the clouds isn't helping!", Launch roared, shooting a few rounds.

Tien sweatdropped a little at that, but he saw the wisdom in Launch's outburst. Staying around here wasn't going to net them much, they had to keep moving to catch those kids, after all.

"She's right, you know? Let's go.", he called out to Chiatzou, and the three silently dove into the church, the shadows blurring their forms away.

Inside the church, of course, two wax murderers stood guard, at the entrance at the entrance of their clan's layer.

"Did they take the bait?", one whispered to the other, so as to shield the topic from praying ears.

"But of coursssse, they think we all are in one enormoussss location. It will be amussssing to ssssseee how they handle the fact that we will be ssssspliting up and ambusssshing them. After all, Lord Wick made that ilusssion of power by quickly materializing and disssapating our comradessss. Their pssssychic ssscry will not be of help here.", his friend hissed back, with a wicked smile.

"Indeed, their ability to ssssense energy leavessssss them at a disssssadvantage. They will sssssoon meet their match. Now make yoursssself sssscarccce, the enemy hassssss arrived!", the other spoke, and with that, the three fools waltzed in, unaware of the calamity that was to befall them, as the two guards hid, they and their comrades plotting the trios downfall. Unfortunately for them, the intruders also had some wild cards up their deck, for qadr is wily and strange like that.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Sssso, you two are on a quesssst to your homeland so asss to sssave it from civil war.", Wick spoke, sipping blood red wine, then focusing his eyes on me, " And you sssseme to have been tagging along, yesssss?"

Laughing nervously, because seriously, this guys eyes were boring into my soul and my existence too, I replied my voice wagering,"Y….yeah. I kind of met them by accident, but I agreed to help them. I know what you're thinking, and no, this isn't for the money, I already have enough of that. Consider it an extension of goodwill. Besides, even I am on a bit of a runaways journey."

"Oh, issss that sssso? You sssseme to have developed an aptitiude in the magic artssss, have you not? With your power, I ssssussspect you could even take down one of my ssssstandard unit ssssoldiers, perhapssss.", Wick replied smirking as if he was dangling that prospect like a marshmallow over a flickering candle fire.

"Please, I'm not that good. Really, I'm just a novice, I've only had these powers for a few days!", I replied, trying to counter. I've always been somewhat sensitive to excessive praise.

"Yet you've managed to outsssmart fearsssome warriorssss and evade murderousss hammerhooodsss, who even had upragded weaponssss and ssssskilsssss. Boy, you have potential, and while I cannot help you, I have taken a bit of an interesssst in you.", Wick replied, his face still holding that smirk, but now it had a bit of a cunning edge.

My eyes betrayed the smallest bit of fear at that, as I thought of how potentially manipulative Wick could be. I really didn't want to be dealing with a Yukari. Boxer noticed that, and immediately intervened to ease my fears.

"Relax, Wick isn't some sort of schemer. Trust me, and even if he was, I'd kick his ass. You remember that time you tried to pull a prank on me, buddy? I think we all know how that worked out.", Boxer spoke, now his time to snicker, baring a grin of razor sharp teeth.

Flustered, Wick immediately retaliated, though not in a way I expected, "Oh sssshut up! We were kidssss back then, and if I recall, you were the one that got drunk firsssst!", he yelled, completely unrefined in his tone.

"Hey, you managed to get us caught anyway….!", Boxer was about to yell, but the crashing of a guard, the poor guy nearly ramming himself into the room immediately shut that conversation down.

"Lord Wick, itssssss an emergencccccy! The intrudersssss, they've managed to breacccch mosssst of our trooopssss! They'll be here in no more than a couple minutesssss!", the guard trembled, so much so that wax was dripping off his forehead like a flowing river.

"By Essstark, can thingssss get any worsssse?! Sssseal off the entranccce, sssstall sssssome time sssso that our guessssts may esssscape!", Wick hissed his orders angrily, and the guard quickly fled, to give the orders to his fellow troops.

With that out of the way, Wick wrung his hands and hissed in frustration, "It wassssnt ssssuposssed to be like thissss! They ssssshhhhhould have been caught off guard!"

Realizing something, I cursed myself silently, "Damn it, Chiaotzu isn't as weak as I thought. He must have sensed the supernatural energies inside you guys splitting when you pulled that chimera wing trick."

Wick nodded in agreement, "Then we have no time to wassssste.", Opening a latch that had been previously been hidden, a hidden pathway opened up on the floor.

"Go through here. But before that, take thesssssse. Itsssss dangerousss to go unarmed after all.", Wick spoke, handing us each a steel fry pan, a steel bat,though lightweight, and a pair of edged boomerangs, silver and sharpened. Megoosa's looked at the boomerangs with interest, while I and Slalin looked ready to grab our stuff.

"Words cannot express the generosity that you have given us. Thank you kindly.", Megoosa spoke slightly, holding her head high.

"Yeah! You're a big help, ya know that! Just don't get your butt whooped by those guys!",Slalin chirped with a smile

"Trust me, I don't know what would've happened if you hadn't helped us. Thanks.", I spoke with a slight smile.

"it wassss my pleassssure. Now come in, you all mussst hurry! Boxer, lead them out of here! I'm counting on you, my old friend!", Wick bellowed, turning his eyes to the cannibox.

"Won't let ya down. Come on guys!", and with that, we descended down the tunnel to somewhere.

Looking at the tunnel Slalin immediately blanched, before quiveringly dragging herself into the underground tunnel, only loaning, "Goddess….. why me.". Megoosa could only sigh at this, and I simply hopped into the hole.

With that done Wick sighed heavily, as he sharpened his knives, as the doors blew right off the hinges.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"AND STAY DEAD, YOU BASTARDS!", Launch roared, bullets whizzing left and right, knocking wax murderers back and making them run in terror.

"That womanssss a luantic, ssssshell bring the whole placcce down at thissss rate!", one hissed in utter fright, yet managed to keep its footing, though not before being disarmed by a chop to the neck.

"This is just too easy, were these demons trying to slaughter themselves?", Tien spoke, as Chiatzou countered a frizz spell with a dodon ray.

"Well whatever they're doing, it's up to us to stop them!", Chiatzou stated, though not before one of the wax murderer squad leaders stood up, looking far different from the rest, purple in color with a green flickering flame burning atop his head.

"Foolisssh humansss, if you wissssh to find thosssse children, you will have to go through ussss. I made a promissssse to my friend over protecting them, and I am not one to break hisss vowsssss.", he hissed in anger, his comrades doing the same.

Tien looked a little puzzled at this, for he had thought that these demons were nothing but blood lusty maniacs. King Piccolo hadn't exactly been a good example for him, after all. Yet, here they were lecturing him on his prejudice. But, now was the time for questioning.

"Where did the boy go? Where will he be heading? What is his purpose?", Tien asked, cold and calculating.

"Yeah, what the hell is that brat up to?!", Launch replied angrily, and Chiatzou nodded his assent to that curiosity.

The wickerman sneered at this, "Why ssshould I tell you? Its obvioussss that you will ssssstop him from saving that faraway land. Maybe, if you beat me, I'll tell you then! I've lived for 500 years human, prepare to meet your matcccch.". Looking back at his squadron he called out, "None of you ssshalll interfere, thissss is between him and I.", then slipped into a stance, unsheathing his knives.

Tien almost wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the situation, but held himself back, revealing only a small chuckle, "If you think you can take me on, go right ahead. Although, I'm afraid you won't last long. But before I fight you, why don't you tell me your name?", he said, slipping into his signature crane school stance.

The wax murderer narrowed his eyes at the veiled insult, " The namesss Wick, Lord Wick for you. You'll regret ssssaying those wordssssss!", and with that, the demon launched himself at Tien.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Why me?", Slalin moaned, as we hurried through the tunnel, rumblings echoing through the tunnel from all the commotion happening upstairs no doubt.

"Now is not the time Slalin, cast away your fears! Wick gave us a diversion, and we must take advantage of it to the very limit! To not do so would be the highest folly!", Megoosa bellowed as she picked up the pace. Meanwhile, dust began drizzling slightly from the top

"She's right you know. Also, if we don't run fast enough, this tunnel might cave in on itself!", Boxer yelped, running quicker too.

Both me and Slalin bugged our eyes out at this, "IT'LL WHAT?!". Truth be told, I had expected some misfortune troubling our escape plan, but nothing this dangerous!

Looking at the Nimbus, I ran to the thing, and hopped right on, Slalin following my lead. A good thing too, because our legs felt like lead, and felt ready to snap in two like desiccated twigs.

"FASTER, NIMBUS, FASTER! I DON'T CARE HOW YOU DO IT, GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE!", I screamed, and sensing my panic, being scared witless itself, it sped up, not enough to lose Boxer and Megoosa, but enough so that we were a little ahead of them. Hearing the tremors and cracks of a few rocks, even they started palpitating a little and ran even faster. However, fate wasn't ready to give us luck, as three giant brown worms and a stone statue fell from on high, and took no time to identify as hostiles, before flying at us.

"Ah crap, it's a bunch of lugworms and a dirty dogu! Slalin, get ready! Those worms can and will bite!", I screamed. Slalin nodded and casted a light kabuff on us, though not before chucking a fireball at the golem like creature that had nearly rammed her, then casting a blue haze to envelop it, a kasap spell most likely, before running in with her pole screaming a war cry, whacking it on the head.

"Oh you insufferable nuisance, take this, twin power throw!", Megoosa shouted, concentrating mana into her weapon, enlarging it, before throwing her boomerangs, decapitating two of the lugworms. Unfortunately, the one left behind called for reinforcements, and more lugworms arose from the ground. Seeing this, she did something that was par for the course for me, ran up to it, and discharged electricity from her hands, frying the thing.

"This is far too troublesome, Sweet Breath!", Boxer called, making the enemy fall into a drowsy stupor with his ever useful sweet pink mist, before unsheathing two knives and proceeding to make mincemeat out of a weakened terracotta warrior. He then proceeded to hop on the nimbus and do some ariel dive bombing. That guy was far too flamboyant, I tell you!

As for me, I swung my frying pan, temporarily disarming one lugworm, before lobbing a crack spell at one of the terracotta warriors, giving me some distance, though not before a lugworm could sneak up on me and bit me, quite hard too.

"Argh!", I seethed in pain, and hearing this, the lugworm bit a little harder, piercing flesh, and I screamed. This was my first time actually being hurt seriously, and boy, the pain burned like a raging fire! It wouldn't hurt if I had a wall with me right now!

Wait a minute, that's it!, I snapped, new knowledge flooding my veins, yes, that would do!

"BUFF!", I shouted, seals working to harden my skin so that no enemy would be able to penetrate it without extra effort, noticing this, the lugworm detached itself, and in that process, I squashed it to smithereens, a little out of vengeance, and a little out of fear. I've never been fond of slimy things. As for the last lugworm, it had run away a while ago, leaving us with the carcasses and the gold they had dropped. Pickpocketing our loot, we decided to take stock of our situation to ensure we didn't rough ourselves up too much.

"Hey, when did you learn buff! Don't tell me you're trying to replace me as support?!", Slalin shouted pointing her finger at me accusingly.

"Oh, I wouldn't even try! Besides, I can probably beat you hands tied behind my back!", I sneered teasingly.

Slalin lowered her pole threateningly, though not before Megoosa poked us with her boomerangs, glaring ominously. Seeing this we backed down, and while Boxer chuckled we trudged on the tunnel everlasting.

0o0o0o0o0o

"You're tougher than I thought.", Tien spoke, dodging a knife to the clavicle.

"Ive ssssen better human, but you are definetly sssssomething.", Wick spoke, jumping back for distance, but the lie in that statement was as clear as day. Ive never met sssssomeone ssso ssstrong? Even that child hero from back in the day and thossse fooolisssh dipolomats from Nizmo weren't thisss issss he?!, he thought, a little frightened.

"Frizz convergence!", he chanted, and at once, three rather large fireballs emerged, condensed into one gargantuan fiery ball of death, to rain down onto its target.

"Stop distracting yourself, you're leaving yourself open. Although, you did hit me well with that one!", he heard from behind, and then a punch to the gut, sending him flying.

"Lord Wick!", his men languished, but it was of no use. Physics demanded that he crash into that wall, and crash into it he did.

"Nghhh… do you honesssstly believe that I will fall to sssomething like that? I will fight to my last breath for my friends and people!", he rose, head held high, knife in hand

"Then show me your dedication. Prove to me just how much you will put on the line for your allies.", Tien spoke, rushing forward.

At first, the candle demon looked panicked, but then, just as Tiens fingers hit it, he melted into a scattering of embers.

Launch could only gape at this, "Damnit, where the hell did he go! Stop playing around!"

Even Chiatzou tried scanning for him again, but couldn't find a presence.

Even Tien was left for a loss of words, as he began anxiously scanning the area with his three eyes. Seeing them be useless in this attempt, he stilled his breathing and focused on his ears.

For a minute, he could hear nothing but pristine silence. Then a woosh to the left, above him.

There! he thought, and on reflex, uppercuted the area, but nothing but air was there. What?! Where did he go he thought reflexively, tensing himself.

"Tien, look out!", Launch and Chiatzou both cried out, but it was too late, as Wick brought his knife down from the right.

"BURNING MIRACLE SLASH!", Wick called, and with that, Tien felt a rather odd pain. The cut burned, yet it felt like something was being drained out of his body, something that wasn't blood.

Chiarzou was quick to pick up on this, "He's draining Tiens ki! He's using it to heal himself!", he pointed out.

Launch was quick to retort, "Doesn't that ki crap keep you alive?! Tien, you better watch your ass, you aren't dying on me again!"

"Hah, that for ssssure mussst have weakened you. It sssems that thisss fight isssss nearing an end.", Wick smiled smugly, before he felt an iron, vice like grip on his leg, his smile vanishing.

"You put your guard down, and I think you know what happens next.", Tien stated, as he subjected Wick to a throw to the floor, then a flurry of punches, finishing with a brutal kick. By the time Tien was done, Wick was seeing stars.

"Impossssible! Lord Wick has been defeated?!", his soldiers cried, their ranks begining to shift a little in fear.

Looking at them Launch shouted, "Damn right he's been! You guys picked the wrong fight!"

Wick could only stare up at the man that had won against him, and sullenly spoke, "My men, I can only assssk you for forgivenesssss for letting you all down. Pyro, leader of the head guard, I entrusssssst you with my ssssseat. I may have fallen, but our people have not, my friend and hissss alliessss have made it away by now, and if sssso I wasss glad to ssssacrificccce my life for so jussssst a causssse. Now then, three eyed warrior, what do you sssstand for? Do what you mussssst do.", he finished, eyes tired and dead, prepared for the next life.

Tien could only stare at the demon, before speaking, "Where in the world did you think I was going to kill you. I beat you, so hold your end of the deal."

Wick replied sullenly, before speaking once more, " Ah yesssss, that. I do take my promisssses ssseriousssly, ssssso here it isssss. In thessse hallssss liessss an entrenccce to the outsssside, one different from where you came. Find it, and you will find them. I will sssssspeak no more."

Launch looked ready to shoot the poor guy into oblivion, but Chiatzou stayed her hand, "Wait, Launch! Don't shoot him, he's already been beaten up!"

"I don't give a damn! If he wants to play smart, then hell, we can too!", she replied, cocking her gun, before Tien spoke.

"Launch, no." Tien spoke coldly, a little angry that Launch would suggest something like that.

Launch huffed, and put her gun away, "Fine, but what the hell is so important that these kids would be in cahoots with monsters and risk their lives for it?

The question ran through Tien's mind, and coupled with Wicks words, he began to think.

"Tien, is something wrong?", Chiatzou spoke, looking at Tien's furrowed brows.

"Is it just me, Chiatzou, or is there something more to those kids than what we thought?", Tien asked, sure that Chiatzou had the same thing on mind.

"I don't know, but this is starting to be something that's more complicated than we thought. Come on, we should hurry, Launch already starting searching, and she's getting impatient," he said, pointing to Launch, growling at some of the wax murderers that dared to snicker at her failure to find their lords secret passage, glaring at the two.

"And what the hell do you two think you're doing?! I already carried that damn Candle man's ass to a stretcher, and you two are sitting there talking! Help me out here, will ya!", launch replied, not angry, but a little annoyed, pointing to Wick, on said stretcher.

"Uh…. Right. Let's go help her." Tien spoke, truth be told, he didn't want to deal with her anger spasms. While Launch was a great person to be around, her anger was frightful to behold. "So anyway, I think it's safe to say we've lost those damn kids. We might as well just get the hell outta here.", Launch said, calming back down a little

"We might as well go to Bulma and tell her what we found out here. Something is really odd about all of this.", Chiatzou said while Tien folded his arms, silently nodding his approval at his plan.

Nearby, and oblivious to him, two certain guards snickered at the scene.

"Hesssss ssssso dominated by her. Ironic how that worksssss, yessssss?"

"Oh pleasssse, you know the ssssaying, the bigger they are…."

"The harder they fall.", the both echoed.

At this Lord Wick couldn't help but chuckle, but then a loud sneeze broke his thoughts.

"Oh my, why are we underground?! Tien, what is this place?", Launch stated, having shifted to her blue-haired persona.

The Wax murderers could only sweatdrop at this, seeing such an odd occurrence go by. Perhaps they really hadn't left home at all, if this was what was going to be a daily occurrence here.

0o0o0o0o

As the tunnel loomed on, we all began to slowly ease up. The thumping and dust drizzling had even given away to an eerie, yet calming silence. Even the nimbus had managed to calm itself down, and we had hopped off of it long ago.

"Phewee, THAT sure was something, huh?", Slalin called, giggling a little as she spoke those words

"You said it! Seriously, adventures great, but that was WAY too close.", I nodded, dusting myself off from the cave dust.

"To be quite fair, I had a premonition that we would eventually manage to outspeed that three-eyed man and his friends. But that does raise the question, where in the goddesses name are they now? I would have thought they would have followed us after they fought off Wick and his men. After all, the rumblings have stopped.", Megoosa put forth, making us all furrow our brows in concentration.

Boxer was also thinking about this possibility, and decided to speak his mind, "Where are they indeed? But, let us be thankful we have some sort of distance from them. The farther we are from them, the better. Now, I'm sure we should be reaching the tunnels end. I've walked down here several times myself."

I looked up, and sure as day, there stood the exit, light streaming out of it like as if it had fallen from heaven n itself.

"Phew! That's a relief, cause my legs felt just about ready to pop off!", I sighed in relief, while Slalin could only stare at the exit like as if God himself had descended to go meet her. Megoosa and Boxer could only sigh at our little bout of stupidity, and the Nimbus simply floated, not choosing to talk as for now. With that, we simply left the tunnel, ecstatic to have shaken our hunters off of our trails.

Unfortunately, the lights effect on our eyes, now accustomed to the darkness, was in effect like being bedazzled.

"Ouch!", I cried out. Seriously, there's nothing worse than somebody opening a light after a while in a dark room!

Slalin and the others winced a little too, and even the nimbus recoiled back a bit. As our eyes adjusted to the morning light, we immediately spotted a motorcycle, with the keys on and the ignition running, no less!

"Good heavens, who the heck would leave a motorcycle running around?!", I called, searching high and low for the perpetrator.

Slalin looked around for that same person to, while Megoosa grumbled, pinching her nose "Whoever this person is, they have far too much money for my liking. Such a waste…"

Meanwhile, Boxer chuckled to himself, after eying a candle flame sticker slapped onto it, "Ah Wick…. You really outdid yourself this time."

Megoosa looked at Boxer with a hint of surprise, "That candle? Since when was he wealthy?"

He only responded with a laugh, "He's always bought things he doesn't need. There was this one time….", he spoke before I cut him off.

"As much as I would _love_ hear this story of yours, let's get the hell outta here. Anybody know how to ride this thing?", I asked, pointing toward the motorcycle that was to be our ride.

Boxer could only sink into a cloud of depression at this, mumrmuring, "Why does nobody like my stories….?"

Megoosa did not spare him any solace in his sulk, "Because you acted like an idiot. Now let us progress with our objective."

Boxer, now out of his slight sulk, predictably hopped onto the front seat, and beckoned for us, strapping his helmet, "Hop on, because we've got a long way to go!"

Slalin, on the other hand, was overjoyed at this, "A city wide adventure, eating good food, fighting off badass martial artists, and now this?! I think I'm in heaven!"

With that we sped off, running round and round, ecstatic over our victory, as the lush green trees swept by, the skyscrapers towered on high, as we went laughing as our fears went out the window…..

And crashed into our eye view, for standing to the side of us, both running, were the jolly orange wearing hero himself, though a lot shorter, and the lavender haired demon of terror.

"Hey, it's the funny people!", Goten shouted, while Trunks simply rolled his eyes in disappointment.

"Goten, how many times have I told you not to blow our cover!", Trunks seethed of a little, clearly evident that these two made quite a dysfunctional pair.

"Hey, my dad does it all the time, and he wins anyway!", Goten countered back

"Yeah, like that one time my dad kicked your dad's butt!", Trunks yelled right back.

"Well…. My dad kicked you dads butt when he first came here!", Goten shot back

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did too!"

"Did not! Wait a minute you cheate….", Goten fumed , before Slalin roared

"Oh my goddess, will you two SHUT THE HELL UP!", then proceeding to launch a huge homing fireball at them, before Megoosa stopped her hand.

"At ease, sister. I will handle these pests.", she spoke, and with that, fired an electric wave at both of their legs. At once, they both fell flat on their faces as they just couldn't run anymore.

"Finally, some damn peace and quiet!", Slalin spoke, folding her arms in triumph.

I could only nod my assent, "You said it! Those two aren't called the twin terrors for nothing!"

Boxer could only stare out, however, "I don't think that's the last we've seen of them.", he spoke, warily.

The three of us could only laugh at this, cajoling in unison, "OH PLEASE WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?"

"A bunch of things, you know!", we heard as we saw Trunks and Goten both propel themselves with Ki from their arms.

"Oh come on!", Slalin could only gape in annoyance as Megoosa looked at them with death in her eyes. Clearly, she was very ticked off.

"You thought we'd go down that easy? Think again!", Trunks grinned smugly, to my annoyance. Those two were such pricks as kids sometimes!

Boxer, however, was simply driving, screaming, and singing in a horrid pitch in order to ignore the situation.

What a lovely afternoon, I tell you.


	11. Chapter 11: Found in the Clouds

**Hey Everybody! Back again with a chapter, how the time flies! I just hope it's too your liking! Piccolo was a little hard for me to write here. Although, I just have been way to hectic lately, hence the short chapter. I hope it's to your liking though!**

 **Rakshasas- Evil demons from hindu mythology**

Piccolo was most definitely not having a good day.

First, those kids had managed to scare Son and avoid capture, then Yamcha's ki went out for a bit, Chi Chi and Bulma both came back to Capsule Corp with head injuries, and Tien's ki managed to be underground of all places. Not to mention the angry crowd of people that tried to bum rush, stab and practically attempt to rip him to pieces in order to get revenge for what his sire did. Apparently, some humans still had enough intelligence to remember the world domination scheme his sire had nearly accomplished.

0o0o0o0o

Piccolo had flown down, walking into the city for some information. These kids were really going to be the death of him, he could tell that much.

 _Just how long is this going to take?_ , he growled inwardly. Those brats were nowhere to be found and yet had managed to evade capture three times. Clearly, they had some sort of trump card.

Piccolo, with that thought in mind, began to formulate a strategy, slightly marveling at how these troublesome brats had managed to get him to think about how to intercept them before he heard a loud scraping noise and the rustling of voices.

At first, Piccolo had thought it was a gang fight, and wisely moved the other way to avoid catching attention. What he hadn't expected was for the crowd to move to him. They all had scowls on their faces, weapons in some hands, and pure malice in others, all directed at him, with one with markings on his head. The old man's knowledge indicated he was a priest of sorts.

" _ **Rakshasa, chalegao yahsee**!_ " (Demon, begone!), he shouted, others muttered prayers against shaytanis in the backgrond, while keeping their distance from the preist, and steeled their footing.

Piccolo took a quick look at them, and it didn't take much to figure out what they wanted.

I don't have time for this, Piccolo thought, before he veered and caught a knife flying at him. When he found its wielder, he was a little surprised to see that it was a ten-year-old boy, followed by his sister, who held the knives.

"G…. Get away from here! I…. I don't want to hurt you, but if you try anything funny….", the boy stammered, his sister trembling behind him.

Piccolo simply stared at this spectacle and simply snorted, "Kid, how much of an idiot like my sire do you think I am? I'm through with the whole evil overlord phase anyway. If I really wanted to kill you, you would've already been dead."

With that, Piccolo swept himself upwards and flew away, earning himself a gaping bunch of angry Indians and a gaping youth.

0o0o0o0op

 _Seems like they really weren't worth my time, after all,_ he thought silently, breaking his lull over that memory, as he heard a loud noise, flying upwards to intercept them.

But, it still really didn't add up, any of this really. It makes sense that the kid was busy trying to get the dragon balls, he probably wanted a wish. The real question was why, and how in the world he even came to this world in the first place. Piccolo could clearly tell a schemer from a bystander, and this boy certainly wasn't the former, although he would have to be a little cautious regarding that, considering just how much he managed to know about them. So what managed to screw him over here?

 _Somethings going on, and if I need to pry that brats mouth for it, so be it,_ Piccolo thought, scowling as he did.

As he flew closer and closer, he was a little astonished as to why they hadn't managed to protect themselves better. The boy had a frying pan for a weapon, and Piccolo really wasn't ready for that. The damn harpy had practically made him avoid those things like the plague; he hated them just as much as he used to hate the old man. That gray clothed girl had a pair of flimsy boomerangs he could break with a light ki-infused touch, while the trench coat boy only had a pair of knives. Meanwhile, looking ahead to the other girl, all she had was that thing that Gohan used to play with when he went to school, a baseball bat or something. He had never paid much attention to what human brats played with anyway; he usually wound up scaring them off after all.

But, as soon as he got ever closer, a furiously screeching noise rang through his ears and tore them asunder. Piccolo nearly came to a careening halt while flying due to the vocal chaos ramming through his ears. However, the noise was manageable, if a bit on the painful side.

Gingerly moving his fingers to his ears, Piccolo was poised to rip them both off in order to move ever further, that is, of course, until one of those brats pulled out a chalkboard and proceeded to make the mother of all hellish noises.

Needless to say, Piccolo was not a happy camper. Cringing in pain, to the point where he couldn't see and think straight due to the vocal chaos now tormenting his body, he vowed with great fervor that those kids would regret ever meeting with him.

0o0o0o0o0o0o

"Aw, iz the poor wittle slugman hurt?", Slalin mockingly drawled out, trying her best to avoid laughing at Piccolo's ear hell, while failing miserably.

"Sister, while I do agree that defeating an enemy is satisfying, I'm concerned you are developing a taste for sadism.", Megoosa spoke, deadpanning.

"Hey, pain is good for you.", Boxer replied, having been looking out into the sky earlier.

"What's also good for you is sanity, which you all clearly seem to lack. Also, Boxer, I'd hate to say that to your future spouse, I don't think you into masochism.", I replied back in turn. Seriously, on a scale of one to ten, these people are an eleven on the lunacy scale.

Boxer flushed a sharp scarlet at this, and Slalin howled loud enough in her laughter to make herself shake, "Oh this is rich! The high and noble king likes being taken down a peg, huh?!"

"I...It's not like that!", Boxer yelped, even more, embarrassed than before

I was in no better shape myself, writhing on the nimbus in utter hysterics, even as Megoosa incessantly prodded me with her hand, wearing an alarmed expression.

"Wh...What is it now?", I replied, still on the residues of a laughing buzz, only to see Megoosa point at a perfectly normal Piccolo, careening toward us, without his ears.

" _Oh_. I might have forgotten to say that he can regenerate….", I muttered out loud, only to get a baseball bat to the head

"YOU IDIOT! THAT'S THE LAST TIME I EVER TAKE ADVICE FROM YOU!", Slalin howled in anger, as her sister tried restraining her by putting her in an overglorified chokehold.

"Woo! Fight Fight Fight…, what? I'M BORED OKAY?!", Boxer called, defending himself when I looked at himself questionably

"Of course, this is how Allah thought I should go…. If the angel of death could laugh, I'm sure he would be doing it right about now…."

"Zain, condemning your fate only helps to make it worse," Megoosa called, as she finished calming Slalin down.

"DON'T YOU THINK I KNOW THAT!?"

0o0o0o0o0o0o

Piccolo was flying closer, swerving his weight to block the path of the dark nimbus, as the old man's knowledge told him.

"He's coming, he's coming, what are we going to do?!", the blue-clothed girl shrieked, gawking at him.

He resisted the urge to scowl, and failed miserably, though it wasn't like he minded, _Can that girl do nothing but sit and scream?_

What he hadn't expected, however, was for the girl to chuck a fireball at him. Swerving with slight wildness due to the surprise, he righted himself to size his enemies up. Apparently, they weren't as weak as they seemed.

Piccolo then swerved in again, only to find that the boy had managed to chuck an icicle at him, though that was no matter. Frying it instantly with a masenko, he flew in closer. Nearly dodging a bolt of lightning the other girl managed to chuck him in time, as well as that cloud of pink haze that other cloaked man emitted, he flew right up in front, obstructing their path.

the boy in front who had lobbed an icicle at him giggled sheepishly as if he had been caught stealing from a cookie jar, rather than having been running from the earth's strongest warriors. Nevermind the fact that his ears were currently growing back right now, and he only had his eyes to see what was going on, he was sure that the brat was probably babbling some sort of half-baked apology. No matter, because these kids would be brought back to Bulma, and he could wash his hands clean of the whole mess.

"Alright, brats, start talking. I might not have ears, but I'll be able to tell if you're planning anything. Don't even try to pull anything on me, because it'll be the last thing you'll ever do."

0o0o0o0o0o0

"Well… it seems we're in a bit of a pickle.", Boxer spoke, drawling it out like he was talking about the weather, not a half demon alien fighter that could beat us up to a bloody pulp.

"A LITTLE, YOU SAY?! BOXER, HAVE YOU LOST YOUR DAMN MIND?!", Slalin screamed out into nowhere, god knows what she was trying to do by doing that. Perhaps it was a coping mechanism of sorts?

"You know, jumping off this cloud and committing suicide is looking very appealing now, I mean, we're stuck between lunatic lazuli and grumpy green.", I spoke aloud, and that's when Megoosa festered me with an odd look.

"Zain…. Say that first part again."

"Uhh…. you mean the suicide part…?", I spoke aloud, not sure where exactly this was headed.

Of course, nothing could have prepared me for what would happen next. Megoosa literally shoved our umbrellas into our hands and took hers into her hand.

"Uh….sis, exactly what the heck are you doing?", Slalin looked baffled, and a little worried too. I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if one of us lost it by now, this whole day had been one big drug trip! I wouldn't be surprised if someone cracked under the pressure!

Megoosa simply looked up at us, and smiled sweetly, which _**definitely**_ wasn't ringing alarm bells, "Why… killing myself of course.", And with that, she took her umbrella and jumped off the cloud.

Boxer simply just looked at her, and only spared one sentence, "I knew she'd crack first!"

"SHUT THE HELL UP MORON, THAT'S MY SISTER YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT!"

"Hey, there's no time like the present!", Boxer called, as he prepared to fling himself off too.

Slalin and I both just stood there, umbrellas in hand, looking at a very disturbed namekian, as we both said our prayers to whatever divinities we had, closed our eyes, and held fast to our parasols, I had the thought to say one final thing.

"Mind if I take you up on that casket offer?"

0o0o0o0o0o0o

Piccolo had expected many things out of these people, scratch that, he expected a lot of damn things, but suicide was not one of them. So he just went slack-jawed when that gray clothed brat went and flung herself into the sky, holding nothing but an umbrella.

 _That does it...All of these brats are insane…._

To make matters worse, all four of them seemed to be considering leaping to their deaths, even that young brat, and that screeching girl, although at least those two had the brains to look scared about it.

Of course, I have to save these fools, Gohan's devil of a mother and that blasted blue-haired annoyance would never let me hear the end it if I let them be., he thought to himself, as he essentially flew toward the four of them

Which is why, as soon as those idiots had jumped off, he grabbed the four of them with his arms, elongated a bit of course.

The boy once again did nothing but stare at him, but this time, it was the stare of a scared animal. Clearly, he had truly not wanted to do it, as Piccolo had assumed. However, what disturbed him was how desperate the boy's eyes looked. He had only ever seen such things in his sire's memories. It was as if they were a breadth's edge from death, and stricken with terror and worry. Yet somehow, he managed to plaster a smile on his face and act like that idiot Son.

"As much as you all seem to have a death wish, I'm not in the mood to oblige. You're coming with me, whether you like it or not. Suck it up if you hate it that much, I don't care.", he replied lazily, finally relieved that all this madness was over

"Who said that we hated it?"

This time, it was Piccolo's turn to swerve at the girl clad in blue, who had a wide grin on her faces.

"How could you have not? You've basically been running away, and are probably more tired than anything in the world."

However, that only seemed to incense their grins to stretch ever further, as they began to giggle and laugh, "We've finally been noticed! It's what we always wanted! I was always trapped inside that stuffy castle for so long! Call me selfish, but this war is the only reason I'm being able to see the world, even though it's killing my people. It's strange don't you think, the idea that I actually might, in some twisted sense, want this war to go on to satisfy my freedom? I must be quite a horrible person. What a disgrace to royalty I am, fooling around while my people suffer."

"I can agree to that, at least. Us royalty have so many responsibilities, it's almost crushing. I'm surprised we haven't had kings that have gone made from the stress.", the trench coat boy replied in turn, offhandedly

The girl clothed in gray seemed to take this in silent stride, but Piccolo knew that that facade was a farce. Deep down, she was silently scrambling to see just where she had gone wrong with that blue haired girl, who was her sister. He would've known, for he had been the wielder of that stare at one point as well.

Of course, trapped in his thoughts like this, he barely registered the tugging of his weighted armor, when he looked down, he saw the boy again, his long cloth garment flapping in the wind, singing a little tune.

"As the days go floating by, what will you see in this world of lunacy...? Oh sorry, is there something you wanted to ask me? Sorry for tugging your shirt, simple reflex really."

Piccolo made up his mind right then and there, whatever happened, he was never talking to these brats again, they were almost as screwed up in the head as his sire was.


End file.
